KINGSTON, Jamaica, CMC – The Jamaica government is moving to deal with the deficit in mathematics at the primary and secondary levels and Education Minister Rev. Ronald Thwaites says there will be an increase in allocation towards ensuring that sufficient mathematics specialists are placed in schools.
He said that only nine per cent of secondary school teachers are qualified to teach mathematics up to grade 11, while 31 per cent of primary teachers are not adequately qualified to teach the subject.

WASHINGTON, CMC - The United States Department of State says it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Belize to protect the country’s cultural heritage. It said the MOU for five years “demonstrates a commitment by both governments to staunch the pillage and illicit trafficking of Belize’s archaeological heritage of African, indigenous Maya, Spanish, and British influences”.

ST. GEORGE’S, Grenada, CMC – Less than a month after he was voted out of office, former prime minister Tillman Thomas remains at the helm of the now opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC).
Party officials who met recently to discuss the outcome of the February 19 general election which saw the NDC trounced 15-nil by the New National Party (NNP), said that Thomas’s leadership was never part of

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Grenada’s Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell has held informal talks with the chairman of the Trinidad-based Caribbean Airlines (CAL) Rabindra Moonan on the role the airline could play on deepening relations between the two Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries.
A statement issued here Tuesday said that Mitchell, whose New National Party (NNP) won the February 19 general elections, has “hinted” that CAL “may be granted flag carrier status by his government in the not too distant future”.

CASTRIES, St. Lucia, CMC – Trade officials from the sub-regional organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) have started a weeklong workshop aimed at enhancing their capacity to formulate effective trade policies and boost participation in regional and international trade negotiations. The event is being jointly hosted by the London-based Commonwealth Secretariat and the OECS and has attracted participation from Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, the British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

GEORGETOWN, Guyana – The narrowness of the election results in Barbados reflects a decision on the part of voters to keep close to the parties to which they have had allegiance. Though it also suggests that Mr Owen Arthur and his team failed to persuade the electorate at large that in the context of the recession which the country has been experiencing, the proposals which Arthur, as an experienced economic practitioner, had put forward, were no more acceptable than the Democratic Labour Party’s promise of patent more of the same.

HAMILTON, Bermuda, CMC - Parliament has passed legislation allowing the One Bermuda Alliance government to borrow an additional one billion US dollars after it said it needed to act swiftly before it ran out of funds.
The Government Loans Amendment Act 2013 was approved by a majority vote  allowing the government to raise the national debt ceiling from US$1.45 billion to US$2.5 billion.

BASSETERRE, St. Kitts, CMC – Opposition Leader Mark Brantley Tuesday said he has written Governor General Sir Edmund Lawrence indicating that opposition legislators will vote in support of a motion of no confidence against Prime Minister Dr. Denzil Douglas.

ST. JOHN’S, Antigua, CMC – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says Antigua and Barbuda has made “significant progress” towards meeting the goals of its fiscal consolidation programme and reduce debt and that it expects the economic recovery to continue in 2013. An IMF mission headed by Geoffrey Bannister has ended a visit to the island to carry out a review of the multi-million dollar Stand By Agreement, St. John’s has with the Washington based financial institution.

ST JOHN’S, Antigua – Despite Antigua & Barbuda still owing 63 per cent of its contribution to the CARICOM Development Fund (CDF), the funding agency is still in the process of developing a programme for the nation.
“Antigua & Barbuda is not yet in receipt of any country assistance programme from the CDF and that is something that we are hoping to address in this meeting, because Antigua & Barbuda has not paid up its full contribution as yet,” Ambassador Lorne McDonnough said in an interview with OBSERVER media at yesterday’s sensitisation meeting.