Min­is­ter of Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment Pen­ne­lope Beck­les held talks with French Am­bas­sador Di­di­er Chabert to dis­cuss op­por­tu­ni­ties of mu­tu­al in­ter­est to both France and Trinidad and To­ba­go in the ar­eas of en­er­gy ef­fi­cien­cy and green en­er­gy, agri­cul­ture, cul­ture and the arts and ed­u­ca­tion.

The fol­low­ing is a press re­lease from the Min­istry of Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment:

Trinidad and To­ba­go’s long­stand­ing re­la­tion­ship with France, which was fur­ther so­lid­i­fied im­me­di­ate­ly up­on in­de­pen­dence in 1962, is re­ceiv­ing a mod­ern boost, ac­cord­ing to Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment Min­is­ter Pen­ne­lope Beck­les.

The Min­is­ter is an­nounc­ing for pub­lic in­for­ma­tion that dis­cus­sions held on Tues­day Oc­to­ber 11 with her team and His Ex­cel­len­cy Di­di­er Chabert, Am­bas­sador of the French Re­pub­lic and Mr. Derek Park­er, Eco­nom­ic Af­fairs Of­fi­cer high­light­ed op­por­tu­ni­ties of mu­tu­al in­ter­est to both France and Trinidad and To­ba­go in the ar­eas of en­er­gy ef­fi­cien­cy and green en­er­gy, agri­cul­ture, cul­ture and the arts and ed­u­ca­tion.

Am­bas­sador Chabert high­light­ed that France has sup­port­ed the de­vel­op­ment of the US$200 mil­lion-plus New­Gen clean hy­dro­gen pro­duc­ing fa­cil­i­ty in Point Lisas, that when com­plet­ed, will be the world’s largest clean hy­dro­gen pro­duc­ing fa­cil­i­ty of its kind, us­ing a smart com­bi­na­tion of so­lar and en­er­gy ef­fi­cien­cy-sourced pow­er. This is a joint part­ner­ship be­tween lo­cal en­er­gy com­pa­ny Ke­nes­jay Green Ltd and French based HDF En­er­gy. The Am­bas­sador al­so spec­i­fied that France is keen on be­ing more ac­tive in Trinidad and To­ba­go, fur­ther sup­port­ing the gov­ern­ment’s re­new­able en­er­gy dri­ve.

Min­is­ter Beck­les, while re­it­er­at­ing the im­por­tance of the move to re­new­able en­er­gy pro­duc­tion, al­so stressed the Gov­ern­ment’s over­ar­ch­ing plans to trans­form Trinidad and To­ba­go’s econ­o­my, pin­point­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties in agri­cul­ture. Co­coa re­search was iden­ti­fied by both par­ties as an area of vast po­ten­tial ben­e­fits. The dis­cus­sions al­so fo­cused on the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty, where the Am­bas­sador is al­so build­ing re­la­tion­ships with Trinidad and To­ba­go’s ex­porters and pro­duc­ers in var­i­ous ar­eas.

Am­bas­sador Chabert al­so com­mit­ted to sup­port needs analy­ses in Trinidad and To­ba­go to fa­cil­i­tate schol­ar­ship op­por­tu­ni­ties, as well as ex­change pro­grammes where French stu­dents can al­so learn the lan­guage and cul­ture of Trinidad and To­ba­go. Out­lin­ing that France has had an in­flu­ence on Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­ture, both par­ties agreed to ex­plore av­enues that will help each oth­er grow.

This meet­ing is a key part of the Min­istry of Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment’s role as a col­lab­o­ra­tive Gov­ern­ment Min­istry, re­spon­si­ble for pro­vid­ing the nec­es­sary pol­i­cy guid­ance and de­vel­op­ment, tech­ni­cal sup­port, ad­vice and fea­si­bil­i­ty as­sess­ment for Trinidad and To­ba­go’s na­tion­al ad­vance­ment. Min­is­ter Beck­les, in her role as Min­is­ter is con­tin­u­ous­ly ex­plor­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties with var­i­ous na­tions and or­gan­i­sa­tions to sup­port the eco­nom­ic trans­for­ma­tion and na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go.