a1577: BBC: Haiti: Economists' association assembly to address Caricom, Cooperatives issues (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Robert Benodin <r.benodin@worldnet.att.net>

Haiti: Economists' association assembly to address Caricom, Cooperatives
issues
BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Apr 4, 2002


[Unidentified announcer] The Association of Haitian Economists, AEH, is
preparing to hold its national assembly for the year 2002. The AEH president
says the main theme for this year, that is, the theme they will discuss, is
Haiti's integration into the Caribbean. The president of the AEH, Henry
Bazin, says many other important issues such as important elements about the
general state of the economy will be discussed.
The AEH president says the question of Haiti's membership in the Caribbean
Community [Caricom] is sitting in the drawers of the Haitian parliament,
whereas there should be a serious strategy for turning this integration into
a reality, according to Bazin's statements to journalists.
[Bazin - recording] //[Passage omitted including indistinct words]. We in
the association thought that it was important to include this point on the
agenda [allusion to cooperatives] but this is not the last time that we
shall talk about it, believe me.// [End of recording]
[Announcer] For their part, members of the AEH board of directors think the
cooperative issue deserves special attention today. Jean-Claude Paulvin, the
AEH vice-president, believes that cooperatives remain an essential way of
saving in Haiti. Paulvin's statements follow:
[Paulvin - recording] //The general assembly that we are going to hold at
the end of the week, that is on Friday and Saturday [4-5 April], will not
concentrate on cooperatives. But this does not mean that the cooperative
issue is not an important issue. Cooperatives are so important that they
have now become a mandatory conduit for the mobilization of savings in the
Haitian economy.
I should point out that cooperatives are part of the Haitian financial
system. When I say the Haitian financial system, I mean all the mechanisms
and means through which financial transactions are carried out within the
Haitian economy. So, there are the banks, there are the cooperatives and
there are also other types of institutions such as insurance companies and
so on within the Haitian economy.
So, for us economists the cooperative issue is fundamental and primordial.
We must understand it, intervene when necessary, and then give explanations
to the public. We have done so on several occasions. As our colleague and
friend Henry, the president of the AEH, said a moment ago, we intervened
several times. We worked out - [changes thought] we wrote many articles and
we gave many interviews on this issue.//
Source: Signal FM Radio, Port-au-Prince, in Creole 1230 gmt 3 Apr 02
/BBC Monitoring/ © BBC.