The OECS Secretariat, in collaboration with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), will be hosting a two-day regional workshop on Social Protection at the Bay Gardens Hotel, Saint Lucia on December 8 and 9, 2009. This meeting will bring together representatives of Development Partners and allied agencies and senior policy makers in OECS Member States to develop an OECS social protection and social safety net strategic framework.

For the better part of this year, the OECS Secretariat has been in the forefront of work aimed at refining social safety net provisions in OECS Member States in order to sharpen and improve the region's response to the global economic crisis. In addition to the conduct of a situation analysis of Social Safety Net programs in OECS Member States, the Secretariat has also convened video conferences with senior policy makers in its Member States and liaised closely with its development partners in defining the scope of the regional social protection agenda.

Representatives from the World Bank, the European Commission Delegation, the Caribbean Development Bank, the United Nations Economic Council for Latin America and the Caribbean (UNECLAC), the University of the West Indies, UNICEF, UNIFEM, and the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank are expected to participate in this workshop.