Senator the Honourable Dr. Amery Browne, Minister of Foreign and CARICOM Affairs, met with officials of the U.S. Agency for International Development of the Eastern and Southern Caribbean (USAID/ESC) on 20th March 2024, at the headquarters of the Ministry of Foreign and CARICOM Affairs.
The delegation was led by Her Excellency Candace A. Bond, Ambassador of the United States of America to the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago and included Mr. Ryan Assiu, Climate Finance Specialist, USAID/ESC; Mr. Courtney Brown, Deputy Chief of Party, of the Youth Resilience, Inclusion and Empowerment (Y-RIE) programme; Ms. Anika Smith, Operations Director, Y-RIE, and Mr. Marlon Bascombe, Trinidad and Tobago Country Director, Y-RIE.
Discussions during the meeting focused on the engagement between Trinidad and Tobago and the USAID, particularly with regard to commencing business operations of the Y-RIE programme in Trinidad and Tobago. Once fully operational, this programme would address the high rates of interpersonal crime and violence among the youth, with a strong emphasis on targeting young males between the ages of fifteen to twenty-nine who may be vulnerable to criminal activity and deviant behaviour.
The Y-RIE delegation also discussed the existing programmes in operation in Grenada, Saint Lucia and Guyana, which are aimed at improving the provision of social services, targeted education, market-relevant skills and of critical note, psychosocial support for the youth who have experienced trauma and are in need of mental health care and healing. The programme also aims to strengthen family and community systems to improve support to youth and create safer communities.
The discussion was informative and fruitful, at the end of which Minister Browne reaffirmed the Ministry’s commitment to facilitating the necessary engagements between the Government of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago and the USAID, with a view to the successful implementation of the Y-RIE programme in this country.
