USVI:UN Officials lime and talk schuupidness on St. Croix

File under: Elite Fish Fries

April 25, 2004 - United Nation's officials came to St. Croix last week to discuss how new, free-trade initiatives and new technologies will affect the Caribbean economy. V. I. officials also took advantage of the two-day conference to promote St. Croix.

The local money quote?

"The free-trade agreement will go into effect next year. We must be ready to compete or else we can be completely phased out,"

...and enter the funny money UN related quotes.
~Pun intended~

Turnbull said the conference has kept the delegates busy, but the delegates were able to visit towns and have dinner at several restaurants. "It is an honor to have the delegates in St. Croix," said Turnbull. "They have been impressed with the island and the hospitality. We want to host more conferences like this on St. Croix."

~~snip~~
The conference was held in the Divi Carina Bay Resort and Casino on the eastern end of the island. At the end of the conference, the dignitaries were treated to a cocktail reception hosted by the government house.

I wonder who paid for the various fetes on this two-day conference chock full with culinary activities?

Was it the UN folk who were here promoting understanding on the impact of their free-trade in the Caribbean, or was it our cash-strapped local Gov footing the bill (in all those local restaurants) out of the Executive Branch budget - or more likely from, the General Fund?

If as I suspect, the latter is the case, it kinda quacks like a subsidy to me...

You know, tax the hell out of everyone - but especially employers - in order to pay for party weekends for politicians trying to promote spending our money on still more UN conferencesss...my preciousss...we must havses our UN conferencessss...we Neeedses them!

In any event, it's hardly free-trade-ish.

In essence, all of this local government spending fun is for the apparent 'prestige' of having UN bureaucrats inform us of the many ways their oxymoronic free-trade regulations are going to possibly trash impact our local economy.

It would probably have been more efficient if our guys just lifted a few barrels of HOVENSA oil and crammed some vouchers into the UN entourage's hotel fridges while they were out shooting craps in the Casino...

Schooops!

Great plan there...