(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) Jamaican diplomat Ambassador Lorne T McDonnough has been appointed the first Chief Executive Officer of the recently launched CARICOM Development Fund (CDF). Ambassador McDonnough assumed his post on 1 November 2008 at the CDF Headquarters in Bridgetown, Barbados. He is responsible for the overall administration, coordination of activities and programmes of the Fund.

The CDF is mandated by Article 158 of the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas to assist Disadvantaged Member States, Regions and Sectors to mitigate dislocating or other adverse effects of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) and to promote equitable development.
    

CARICOM Member States have committed to provide the CDF with start-up financing of US$120M for its first four years of operation, with plans for additional counterpart funding from targeted prospective donor countries, institutions and the private sector for at least a similar amount. The Fund is managed by a Board of Directors drawn from CARICOM.

Ambassador McDonnough demitted office as Under-Secretary for Trade in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, where he was the senior official responsible for Jamaica’s trade negotiations. The new CEO has had a distinguished career in the Jamaican Foreign Service, serving in CARICOM and this hemisphere in a number of capacities over the past twenty-three years. He was Jamaica’s High Commissioner to Trinidad and Tobago and the Eastern Caribbean, as well as Ambassador to Suriname, and Consul General to the Netherland Antilles, and Permanent Representative to the Association of Caribbean States (ACS).

Prior to his service as Jamaica’s envoy in the Eastern Caribbean, Ambassador McDonnough was the Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission in the Secretariat of the Organization of American States (OAS) and later the first Director of the OAS Tourism Unit. Ambassador McDonnough has a BBA from Pace University, an MBA from Long Island University, and an MA from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University. He also has a graduate certificate in management from Georgetown University.

CAPTION: Ambassador Lorne T. McDonnough, Chief Executive Officer, CARICOM Development Fund (CDF).