(Jamaica Observer) Prime Minister Bruce Golding on Friday urged the Caribbean Community (Caricom) to forge a unified approach to effectively address issues such as the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) and fallout from the current global economic crisis.

“We are going to benefit from things like the EPA if we approach it as a regional market rather than each of us having our own little stalls in that huge market of 450 million people,” Golding said, in reference to trade with the Europeans.

“If there was ever a time that we need the strength of a community, it is now,” Golding told the regional representatives.

Under the EPA, 15 Caricom countries will have duty-free and quota-free access to the European Union (EU) market for all goods except sugar and rice. The EU would also have access to Caribbean markets with specified limitations.

Caribbean countries inked the EPA last year, under time constraints set by the EU after an initial refusal by Guyana to sign.

There have been suggestions of possible negative impact that the EPA could have on Caribbean economies, given the imbalance in production capacity between Caricom and the EU.

Golding yesterday said that many years were spent negotiating the EPA, but now that it had been signed “it was as if the work had been done.”

Said Golding: “The application of EPA is what we spent all these years working towards.”

“The work has to be done is ensuring that what poses both opportunity and risk doesn’t end up with our reaping all the risk and not grabbing hold any of the opportunity.”

He added that Caribbean countries had placed emphasis on intra-regional trade without recognising that trade within the region, while a necessary incubator, could not provide the substance for the level of prosperity and growth that the region required.