Dionne Rose, Staff Reporter

Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Trade Ministers will be meeting today in Montego Bay, St. James, for the 20th special meeting of the Council for Trade and Economic Development (COTED).

Top of the agenda of this morning's meeting is a review of the talks at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and discussion on the WTO/Doha agenda.

Other issues that will be discussed include the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) free trade negotiations with the European Union (EU); sugar; bananas and bilateral trading relationships including with the United States.

The two-day meeting will see persons such as CARICOM Secretary-General, Edwin Carrington; Jamaica's trade ambassador, Dr. Richard Bernal, director general of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM) and representatives of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and the Caribbean Development Bank in attendance.

Meeting very critical

According to Ambassador Bernal, the COTED meeting is critical to the joint prime ministerial subcommittee on external trade and the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME), which will also take place in Montego Bay from February 5-6.

The agreements signed off on at the COTED meeting are expected to be submitted to the prime ministerial subcommittee.

"These meetings are particularly important because they are taking place as we begin the final stage of the EPA negotiations and following the resumption of negotiations at the WTO," he said.

The prime ministerial subcom-mittee on external trade and the CSME will be co-chaired by Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller and Barbados' Prime Minister Owen Arthur who has responsibility for the CARICOM Single Market.

The subcommittee will focus on the relationship between the single market, the CSME and the external trade negotiations. The meeting is a preparatory meeting for the intersessional meeting of CARICOM's heads of government in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, which is scheduled for February 12-14.