(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) `The time for preparation is past and the moment of performance is here,’ His Excellency Edwin Carrington, Secretary-General of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) said Thursday.

In remarks during a speech at the Opening of the Thirtieth Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of CARICOM at the National Cultural Centre, the Secretary-General referred to the Grande Anse Declaration and Work Programme for the Advancement of the Integration Process signed in Grenada in 1989 and said the need to deepen the integration process and strengthen CARICOM was today as urgent, if not more so, than it was 20 years ago.

“Distinguished Heads of Government, Ladies and Gentlemen, the baton from our visionary predecessors of Grand Anse has been passed on to us and I know of no reason to believe that we are not capable of completing the race. And, history’s call on us is no less critical or less urgent,” the Secretary-General said.

Secretary-General Carrington was confident that there would be free and frank discourse during the Meeting which he said must lead to a reinvigoration of the integration process, and to the renewal of a commitment to a Community for All.  “To achieve that goal, the debate must lead to a rekindling of the spirit of hope and expectation among the people of the Community and thereby to their re-engagement in the construction of our Community,” the Secretary-General said.

Such an outcome, he added, would also send a clear message to the world that a strengthened Caribbean Community was ready to take its place in the post-crisis global arena.

The Meeting is being held against the backdrop of the global economic and financial crisis, which is a key agenda item.