Chairmanship of the Monetary Council of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) will be transferred to the Honourable Gaston Browne, Council Member for Antigua and Barbuda during the official Handing Over Ceremony on 22 July at the Sandals Grande Antigua Resort and Spa.
Prime Minister Gaston Browne will succeed the Outgoing Chairman, the Honourable Victor Banks, Council Member for Anguilla.
The Monetary Council is the highest decision making authority of the ECCB and comprises the eight Ministers for Finance of the ECCB member governments. Chairmanship of the Council is rotated alphabetically each year among the eight ECCB member countries: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, The Commonwealth of Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines.
Following the Handing Over Ceremony, the Council will convene its 85th Meeting where the ECCB Governor will present the report on Money and Credit Conditions in the Eastern Caribbean Currency Union. The Council will also deliberate on matters relating to financial stability including: de-risking of ECCU Commercial Banks and development financing.
I believe that the time has come when the ECCB monetary council should be comprised of persons with knowledge and experience in Economics, Finance, Accounting, and or business, rather than these finance ministers, who are also the prime ministers of the various countries in the union, who by the way can merely balance their check books, far less to be the regions authority on so important an issue as monetary policy.
This after all is a highly complex technical subject for professionals in the related disciplines rather than politicians, who are clueless in basic finance, economics, and accounting matters, that all impact the technical aspects of monetary policy.
Is it transferred in alphabetical order? If so, the next country will be Commonwealth of Dominica.
yes it is. as is Caricom