Category Archives: Caribbean

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Answers to 10 commonly asked Royal Caribbean drink package questions Royal Caribbean Blog (blog) Our readers ask a lot of questions about the Royal Caribbean cruise experience, especially when it comes to Royal Caribbean's unlimited drink packages. These all-you-can-drink options have never been more popular with guests, but there is often a ... Traders Take Note: Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. (NYSE:RCL) Stock Drops, Weakness in Technical MomentumCML News Royal Caribbean Releases Big Discounts on Summer CruisesKSST (press release) (registration) (blog) Judge Says Mom May Regret Not Taking Royal Caribbean DealLaw360 (subscription) Key Gazette -USA Commerce Daily -Post Analyst all 33 news articles »

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Answers to 10 commonly asked Royal Caribbean drink package questions - Royal Caribbean Blog (blog)

From April 17-28, the Griot Institute for Africana Studies will sponsor a school supply drive to support a new Caribbean Outreach Partnership program.The group will be collecting new or gently used supplies, ranging from basic essentials such as markers and notebooks to classroom charts and exercise books. All of the supplies collected will be donated to the students at the Violet O. Jeffers Nicholls (VOJN) Primary School on the Caribbean island of Nevis.

For the past year, a team of University students and faculty came together to found the Caribbean Outreach Partnership. Professor of English and Director of the Griot Institute for Africana StudiesCarmen Gillespie was responsible for finding the VOJN primary school and initiating contact through the study abroad program.

Sam Lauer 13is an assistant at the Griot Institute who will go on to earn her masters degree at the University this year. She characterized the decision to work with VOJNasa no-brainer.

Carmens summer semester in the Caribbean introduced her to VOJN, and it just so happened that last years summer class spent some time with the students there and fell in love with the school, Lauer said. They wanted to be able to do something amazing for that community, so Carmen held onto the idea and proposed it to our group at the beginning of the fall semester.

Amy Collins 18, one of the participants of the inaugural Bucknell in the Caribbean study abroad trip in 2015, recalled the groups early interaction with the children in VOJN.

Our group visited VOJN to gift the books we collected to the children. The children were so grateful, Collins said. Some of the students showed a few of us around and we noticed the resources at VOJN were relatively scarce. So, we returned to VOJN with a blow-up bed that they could use as an additional cot for sick students, since their nurses office was an allocated space in the back of one of the classrooms and only contained one cot.

Originally, the teams goal was to provide the Caribbean students with a more substantial playground, Lauer said. However, fundraising issues forced the program to change tactics.

We decided to work on a new angle: a true partnership between Lewisburg and Nevis through our schools, Lauer said.

Annie Girton 19, one of the students involved with the Caribbean Outreach Partnership, talked about how the team is pushing to promote communication between children in local Lewisburg schools and the students in the VOJN primary school.

We believe that it would be rewarding to set up a partnership between VOJN and an elementary school local to Bucknell, Girton said. We are asking the students of each school to participate in a pen-pal exchange, whether this be through written letters, handmade crafts, or Skype calls. Our hope is that the students from each school will be able to learn about other ways of life and to teach one another about their own cultures through this exchanges.

The students who are working towards fostering these international connections are optimistic about the effect they will have on students both local and abroad.

I believe that empathy needs to be, in part, cultivated in our minds while were young, so hopefully this experience will open the hearts of the teachers and students in both places, Lauer said.

The students involved in the project have expressed how much the partnership has changed their outlook on both international collaboration and their own futures.

It has steered my personal and professional momentum to some degree, Collins said. I know I want my future career path to include helping people both directly and indirectly. Meeting these kind and vibrant children face-to-face made it virtually impossible not to want to help them thrive, especially in something as fundamentally important as education.

The students involved in the partnership are proud of their perseverance with the initiative and have high hopes for their future efforts to improve life for the primary school students in VOJN.

Im really proud of the work our group has put into this project, Lauer said. We could have given up when we ran into dead ends with funding, but we kept pushing until we finally found something beneficial for all parties. I would love to see the Caribbean Outreach Partnership live on after all those who are currently involved graduate.

Those interested in joining the Caribbean Outreach Partnershipfor the fall semester are encouraged to contact the members of the Griot Institute.

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Griot Institute sponsors Caribbean outreach program to foster empathy, community - The Bucknellian

April 11, 2017 Credit: Paul Selvaggio

With the Global Coral Restoration Project, SECORE International, the California Academy of Sciences and The Nature Conservancy seal their commitment to help rehabilitate coral reefs and preserve them for future generations. This project aims to study and apply coral restoration techniques and practices on a larger scale, integrating coordinated conservation, education and outreach efforts. By "seeding" reefs with sexually reproduced coral offspring, this project aims to help maintain corals' genetic diversity which in turn maximizes their ability to adapt to future conditions. Furthermore, working with sexual coral restoration has the great potential to produce huge numbers of coral offspring from one coral spawning event. The project includes training for partners from island nations and territories, including organizations capable of translating their efforts into local management plans that support this large-scale coral restoration initiative. The Global Coral Restoration Project starts in the Caribbean and is planned to expand into the Pacific region after its initial phase.

"Alarmed by the catastrophic state of their coral reefs, people have made various attempts to restore coral cover with restoration measures," says Dr. Dirk Petersen, Executive Director and Founder of SECORE. "However, outcomes have often been short-lived and lacked an integrated concept. Moreover, the true capabilities of coral restoration have not been exhausted yet. With our joint Global Coral Restoration Project we aim at changing that."

A Caribbean start

Coral reefs are hotspots of diversity that host countless plants and animals. They are a source of livelihood for millions of people and function as essential coastal protection against the frequent tropical storms. Today, coral reefs are on the decline worldwide and doomsday scenarios of their fate have been spreading broadly in the media. In the Caribbean, coral reefs have been seriously degrading over the last three decades, with hurricanes, disease outbreaks and mass die-offs taking their toll. Key reef-building species, such as the elkhorn and staghorn corals, are critically endangered?one focus of this collaborative project is to assist in the rehabilitation of those species.

The first phase of the Global Coral Restoration Project will focus on the Caribbean. Scientists of the three key-partner organizations have gathered profound knowledge about coral reproduction and how to restore and conserve corals of the Caribbean, and plan to use a wide array of tools to implement coral restoration on largerscales.

"The Nature Conservancy has been working throughout the Caribbean for over 40 years, helping to establish millions of acres of marine protected areas and learning from multiple coral restoration efforts including our own," says Dr. Luis Solorzano, Executive Director Caribbean Division, The Nature Conservancy. "Through this collaboration with SECORE and the California Academy of Sciences, we will accelerate the science and innovation required for scaling up coral restoration efforts. Our efforts can help to ensure healthy and resilient Caribbean reefs."

Within the frame of the Global Coral Restoration Project, hands-on practices will be shared with local stakeholders, in turn enabling a more comprehensive approach to assist in the rehabilitation and active restoration of coral reefs. During the past few years, the project partners have studied how to raise large numbers of delicate coral larvae of several Caribbean species, practiced less labor-intensive ways of seeding coral recruits on reefs, developed protocols to choose suitable restoration sites and learned how to efficiently monitor ongoing restoration success.

How to restore reefs on larger scales

Over the last decade, SECORE and partners have pioneered the study of sexual coral restoration applications, a relatively young research discipline. Taking advantage of the corals' sexual reproduction has the potential of producing huge numbers of genetically unique coral recruitsmillions, if done correctly. Those coral recruits could be raised from one spawning event: coral gametes are collected in the wild or at the laboratory and fertilized in vitro. The resulting larvae are cared for and provided with settlement substrates when they are ready to metamorphose into a coral polyp.

SECORE is currently developing and testing techniques to raise and handle large amounts of coral offspring. The time and manpower required to handle coral offspring and plant them onto wild reefs often limit restoration efforts. Accordingly, SECORE and partners have designed coral settlement substrates that self-attach to the reefs, enabling seeding coral recruits to join the reef in meaningful numbers. SECORE and partners are currently conducting pilot projects for larger-scale sexual coral restoration on Curaao and in Mexico.

Education and sharing knowledge

Through this partnership, three capacity-building centers will be established in the Caribbean: in Mexico, Curacao, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. At each location, a local team of experts will test and refine sexual reproduction techniques, and share these through capacity-building trainings and workshops with coral reef practitioners around the world. In addition, local communities will be actively involved in the process, providing local partners with outreach tools to facilitate community engagement. Integrating the communities that are impacted by this work is critical to making any restoration and conservation efforts successful in the long-term.

"Our capacity building centers will foster research and technology development, exchange of knowledge and expertise, and provide training courses and outreach", says Dirk Petersen. "We will host annual training workshops for Caribbean stakeholders. The centers will function as bases to expand our network and to guide local restoration practitioners who have been fighting the decline of their reefs on their own. By joining forces and coordinating efforts in many places around the Caribbean, we can make a real change for the survival of coral reefs."

The first task of the new alliance will be the kick-off workshop entitled "New techniques for coral restoration in the Caribbean" on Curaao this May. Representatives of stakeholders throughout the Caribbean and scientists from various disciplines will meet to learn hands-on practicesincluding collecting and fertilizing coral gametes and practicing the handling of larvae to be seeded onto degraded reefsand share theoretical background knowledge. Each workshop will build on the last, incorporating lessons learned and refining the techniques that enable lasting, larger-scale coral restoration.

Explore further: Laboratory-bred corals reproduce in the wild

Provided by: SECORE international

Researchers of SECORE International (USA, Germany), the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands) and the Carmabi Marine Research Station (Curaao) have for the first time successfully raised laboratory-bred colonies of a threatened ...

Dr Pim Bongaerts, a Research Fellow at The University of Queensland's Global Change Institute (GCI) and ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, and lead author of the study, said deep reefs share coral species with ...

Coral populations in the Florida Reef Tract have declined in the last three decades due to extreme-temperature events and other stressors that cause bleaching and disease. Scientists are now working to save the reef by transplanting ...

A large-scale study of Caribbean coral has yielded discoveries on the pairing process between an endangered coral and the microscopic symbiotic algae they rely on for survival.

Reef-building corals have a symbiotic relationship with Symbiodinium algae, and environmental stressors that cause algae to be expelled from reefs can give rise to the phenomenon known as coral bleaching.

Feeding juvenile corals prior to transplantation into a new reef may increase their survival, according to a study published June 4, 2014 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Tai Chong Toh from the National University of ...

The extent to which climate change impacts the vital marine food web - which feeds the already pressured global fisheries is revealed through a new, innovative study.

When it comes to greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide tends to steal the spotlightbut new research in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) reveals how scientists have developed a new, predictive ...

A recent study of natural groundwater storage reservoirs in New England by hydrologist David Boutt at the University of Massachusetts Amherst found that upland aquifer systems dominated by thin deposits of surface till - ...

Researchers have found signs of fault displacement at well-known rock outcrops in Colorado that mark the end-Cretaceous asteroid impact that may have hurried the extinction of the dinosaurs. They will present their results ...

(Phys.org)An international team of researchers has found possible evidence of life ten kilometers below the sea floor in the Mariana Trench. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, ...

Between October 2011 and September 2015, California saw its driest four-year period in the instrumental record, which dates back to 1895. Parts of the state lost more than two full years of precipitation during the prolonged, ...

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Global coral reef restoration effort launches in the Caribbean - Phys.Org

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC) The Trinidad-based Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) says the establishment of a Caribbean Regulatory System (CRS) will improve conditions for patients in the region to receive safe, efficacious, high-quality drugs.

Access to safe, efficacious and good-quality drugs is a human right which CARPHA, as the regional public health organisation, is committed to facilitating, CARPHA executive director, Dr James Hospedales, told a capacity building workshop on the regulation of medicines.

CARPHA, in collaboration with the Guyana-based Caribbean Community (Caricom) Secretariat and the World Health Organization/Pan American Health Organization (WHO/PAHO), established the CRS.

Hospedales explained that the CRS will focus on providing regulatory assurance for essential generic medicines for the region.

Through the CRS, CARPHA will be able to help countries perform functions such as reviewing, approving and monitoring medicines in a timely manner, allowing patients faster access to quality drugs, he said, adding that it would also help to reduce cost of medicines to consumers and the health system, thereby improving accessibility and affordability.

With only five Caricom countries currently conducting a review of safety, quality, and efficacy of drugs, PAHO country representative for Trinidad and Tobago, Dr Bernadette Theodore-Gandi, emphasised the need for strong regulatory systems for medicines.

She said that limited capacity in the regulation of medicines can have several negative results, including the proliferation of substandard and falsified medicines, warning this can injure and kill people.

The CRS is a new value added service provided by CARPHA and endorsed by Caricom ministers of health. It is not intended to replace already established national regulatory authorities, but rather to augment and support them. It will also coordinate reporting and analysis on medicine safety and quality issues within Caricom.

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CARPHA says Caribbean Regulatory System will help improve ... - Jamaica Observer

In early May, Weight Watchers International is hosting a seven-night, wellness-themed Caribbean cruise aboard the 4,300-passenger MSC Divina , sailing from Miami.

Yes, a company dedicated to weight loss is joining forces with a purveyor of expansive buffets to offer cruising as a viable vacation for those aiming to shed pounds. And many, many people are battling bulges unsuccessfully, with more than a third of Americans medically obese, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As Weight Watchers transforms from a pure weight-loss enterprise into a health-and-wellness company, the idea of embarking on its first cruise was a logical thing to do, said Ryan Nathan, the company's vice president of products, licensing, and e-commerce.

RELATED: TRENDING LIFE & STYLE NEWS THIS HOUR

"We did a lot of research, and we looked at our member base, and our member really is the cruising base," Nathan said. The typical Weight Watchers member is female, 40 to 60 years old, with an average household income slightly above the U.S. average. The cruise "is not slim-down camp," he said, and the company is setting no goals for members in terms of whether the trip is aimed at losing weight, maintaining weight or keeping any gain from the cruise to a minimum.

Despite the abundance of food, drink, and sloth that mass-market cruise lines sell, a week in the Caribbean also offers the opportunity to take the opposite approach: Sleep well, exercise more, and peruse more menu options, with more relaxed lunches and dinners than most people face at home. The ship also offers members an exercise bicycle that faces the sunrise and a jogging track on the open deck, said Rick Sasso, chairman of MSC North America.

"It's a natural for us to go on this endeavor to show our members: Hey, you can have fun and eat great food," Nathan said. "And you don't have to feel like diet is deprivation."

The company, of which entertainer Oprah Winfrey owns nearly 15 percent, reformulated its business focus in late 2015 with a " Beyond the Scale " campaign that aims to help customers "shift their mindset" from weight loss to overall fitness, encouraging everything from becoming less sedentary to eating better. New York-based Weight Watchers said its members lost 15 percent more weight in the first two months following the new program, compared to results with the prior program.

Cruising is also an effective marketing tool for a publicly traded company that has repeatedly sought to reinvent itself amid the vicissitudes of both the equity and weight-loss markets. The new efforts to broaden Weight Watchers' market appeal started in late 2015, several months after the former talk show host acquired her stake and became a director, with plans to promote the company via her celebrity and her personal weight-loss efforts. Weight Watchers has credited Winfrey with helping spur new enrollments and stronger financial results; its stock has gained 39 percent this year.

Prices for the MSC cruise began at $945, and all of Weight Watchers' 500-cabin bloc on the cruise has been sold, a spokeswoman for Weight Watchers said. MSC was stunned by how quickly half the Weight Watchers' bloc sold out, Sasso said. A second MSC-Weight Watchers cruise is planned for November, with additional sailings likely.

MSC is also offering menu options that will list Weight Watchers' points values to help cruisers know whether their selections fit within their personal weight-control plans. "I've asked the entire organization here to embrace this," Sasso said in a telephone interview. "Every aspect, from our master chefs down to the waiters."

On board, Weight Watchers staff will host meetings for "real-time guidance and support" and present customized fitness programs, cooking demonstrations, and seminars from wellness experts. The week-long voyage will also have four ports of calls at which passengers can hike, snorkel, dive, and pursue other physical activities, Sasso said. The May Divina itinerary has stops stop in Jamaica; Grand Cayman; Cozumel, Mexico; and the Bahamas.

"I think this is more a perfect scenario than the other type of vacation that one can take," Sasso said, calling the cruise "a controlled environment" for Weight Watchers' members. "We're making our cruise products already have this wellness aspect." The May wellness-themed cruise, he said, "is just an enhancement."

For Geneva-based MSC, and for such larger U.S. peers as Carnival Corp., Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd., and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., shifting the public's notion of cruising as an oceangoing gallery of gluttony to one of an upscale holiday that embraces fine dining and active lifestyles is critical to attracting a younger, more affluent demographic. The cruise industry of the 1980s, for example, is nothing like today's cruise lines' offerings. The industry has been working feverishly to tout that message and to increase its customer base, with an estimated 25.3 million people expected to cruise this year, up from 15.8 million a decade ago.

Cruise ships also offer no more dietary vice than the average U.S. city, given an abundance of food and drink choices that are far from healthy, Sasso argued. "That temptation is everywhere you go," he said. "Unless you go to an isolated place in the jungle, you're going to have temptation everywhere."

The newer ships also devote increasing real estate to their spas-a revenue source, to be sure-and most have extensive gyms stocked with equipment, Sasso noted. "When you have 20,000-square-foot spas on a cruise ship, that is unparalleled in the hotel industry, unless you're in some huge resort."

For cruise lines, affinity groups of the wellness sort that Weight Watchers is heading also tend to mean higher revenues, and margins. The $945 minimum fare on MSC, for example, is higher than the company would otherwise command for many of its berths for the same week. That's one reason for the proliferation of theme cruises, from Star Trek to country western music to a Holland America Line Alaska cruise focused on O, The Oprah Magazine, Winfrey's monthly lifestyle periodical.

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A Weight Watchers Caribbean cruise aims to prevent overeating ... - Chicago Tribune

What is a marijuana index?

The global cannabis industry values more than US$150 billion currently. Cannabis sales in North America alone were more than US$7 billion in 2016.

A marijuana index lists the stocks of the major marijuana firms. The North America Marijuana Index, https://marijuanaindex.com/ lists all the major marijuana stocks on a combined North American Index and then separately for America and Canada. I have been tracking the movement of the stocks over the last few months and they are performing excellently. This is the same for Europe and I believe it is headed in the direction of a global index. The Caribbean must prepare itself so as not to be caught off guard, considering that we are aware of what is going on. The global industry will exist with or without the Caribbean's participation in the market. It is better to organise now to increase the Caribbean's share of this global industry.

What is Scarce Commodity's objective?

Against this backdrop, Scarce Commodity was established by the University of the West Indies to provide consultation, technical support, educate, enhance and market the potential of the Caribbean's cannabis/marijuana/hemp industries in a sustainable manner. Scarce Commodity places a strong focus on improving health, expanding industries and creating wealth for the region.

Scarce Commodity's objectives include, but are not limited to, assisting the Caribbean region to understand the importance of the cannabis/hemp industries to increasing growth in GDP per capita, increase intraregional trade, increase foreign currency inflow to the region, increase GDP capita, increase standard of living, reduce the cost of infrastructural development, reduce the cost of energy and, therefore, increasing regional integration and economic development.

What is the issue?

Intraregional trade within CARICOM is the lowest among all trading blocs in the world. Intraregional trade in the Caribbean and Latin America is fourth in the world.

As it relates to global trade and commerce at present, the Caribbean region does not have sufficient commodities to trade within itself and, by extension, does not have enough to trade with the rest of the world sufficiently. As a result, countries have been disenfranchised from each other. Gold is a commodity, rice is a commodity, corn is a commodity, wheat is a commodity, and cannabis and hemp are commodities that will give the Caribbean an opportunity to have a footing in global trade and commerce. Scarce Commodity understands where the global financial markets headed; currently, https://marijuanaindex.com has a solid template that Scarce Commodity will follow and gradually implement for the Caribbean.

How will it operate?

The UWI has put together a team of experts to establish Scarce Commodity to act as the overarching umbrella under which all the alternative Cannabis/marijuana companies will fall.

Scarce Commodity has been conducting extensive semi- structured interviews with respective stakeholders, including but not limited to, the Government officials in the Caribbean and North America, the respective ganja growers associations, the CLAs and cannabis business owners in Colorado, Barcelona and Washington to gain feedback to provide the best packaged proposal to the region. The results emanating suggest that in an attempt to not remain left behind further, and to move Caribbean nations forward, Scarce Commodity should receive minimal bureaucratic hindrances from government ministries, departments and agencies in all countries.

The implementation of the proposed strategy will require a coordinated effort, both internally and externally, from everyone to bring the concept to light.

How will Scarce Commodity integrate the Caribbean?

- The Scarce Commodity Magazine (currently in production) and Scarce Commodity TV are media through which the entity carries out its mandate.

- Scarce Commodity has been packaging and disseminating information on the potential benefits of marijuana under colour codes: green for THC (or tetrahydrocannabinol, the chemical responsible for most of marijuana's psychological effects) pink for CBD (cannabinoid), and the gold for 'ital' on its apparel.

- Scarce Commodity has been conducting economic impact assessment of cultural events which includes cannabis festivals. Based on recommendation from the assessment of the 14th Annual Stepping High Cannabis Festival, Scarce Commodity is UWI Cannabis Cup next Thursday, April 20, at UWI, Mona.

Be there.

- Scarce Commodity is in negotiation with a local proprietor to build an 'innocent' plant village (permanent cannabis village) where local and international tourist can visit, similar to that in Amsterdam, Barcelona, Colorado, Washington, and other states and cities abroad.

Why is Scarce Commodity relevant?

Granting a few licence to a few parties from oversees will minimise the regions ability to benefit holistically. The region is already behind.

Decriminalisation and legalisation of medical marijuana without regulated production has been strongly advised against, based on the recommendations from the United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS). Before we regulate we must create.

If not, production has been and will remain in its same haphazard nature and the fight against illegal production will not cease.

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We need our own Marijuana Index in the Caribbean - Jamaica Gleaner

The finale of CaribeNTM took place on April 3 and this years competition ended in dramatic fashion, as two contestants tied for second place Samantha West from Trinidad and Nkechi Vaughn of Guyana. It was, however, the 5 9 Jamaican who won the judges over with her grace and natural beauty, as well as her ability to work the camera no matter the setting or theme. This seasons competition was held against the backdrop of the enchanting Spice Isle of Grenada, and whether she was covering herself with oil for the infamous jab jab shoot or getting artistic in an underwater shoot, Simmss versatility and raw modelling talent led her to the top position. Along with the title of being the Caribbeans Next Top Model, Shamique was also awarded US$25,000 in cash; an international modelling agency contract with Mint Model Management of New York, USA; a cover feature and editorial spread in SHE Caribbean magazine; and the latest generation iPhone from Flow. Flow congratulates Shamique on her much deserved big win, said Wendy McDonald, senior director Communications, for the Caribbean. Last year, we welcomed the opportunity to partner with CaribeNTM as we saw this as a unique platform to provide exposure of young Caribbean talent both in front of and behind the camera. For us this is not just a competition but it is an investment in the development of the Caribbean fashion industry and our capacity to create local content that is on par with international standards. Additionally, it provides our viewers with unmatched access to local and regional content. The third season of The Caribbeans Next Top Model, presented by Flow, premiered on January 30th exclusively on Flow 1 with 17 fresh-faced ladies from all across the Caribbean. This season, Flow customers were able to watch the drama unfold on the go for the first time via the Flow ToGo app or watch and re-watch any episode via Flow On Demand, ensuring they never missed a moment of the excitement. Tough field

Congratulating the winner, as well as each of the participants, the CaribeNTM co- executive producer, host, judge and former Miss Universe Wendy Fitzwilliam said: Shamique competed amongst our toughest field of aspiring models yet, and always maintained her focus throughout the competition. More than any other participant, Shamique entered the competition with a clear understanding of what is required of her in the modelling industry. She consistently grew throughout the competition and it is this combination of preparedness and dogmatic perseverance with respect to her diet, fitness, mental strength and positive outlook that gave this chocolate beauty, as she was fondly called by her fellow models, the edge. Reality television While there is only one winner, Flow would like to congratulate all the participants and finalists of Season 3 of the Caribbeans Next Top Model. Caribbeans Next Top Model (#CaribeNTM) is produced Starfish Media Ltd and hosted by Miss Universe 1998, Wendy Fitzwilliam. It is a reality television competition based on the original production Americas Next Top Model, and the Americas Next Top Model format, created by Tyra Banks and licensed by CBS International. It follows the stories of aspiring young women seeking to launch a career in the competitive world of modelling. Fitzwilliam hosts Caribbeans Next Top Model as head judge, accompanied by judges: international photographer, Pedro Virgil and Caribbean fashion pundit extraordinaire, Socrates McKinney. For Season 3, CaribeNTM combed more than 30 Caribbean territories and narrowed more than 200 applicants down to 17.

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Shamique Simms is the Caribbean's Next Top Model - Trinidad & Tobago Express

Billie Lourd and Taylor Lautner are packing on the heat!

The two lovebirds continued their PDA-filled vacation on Sunday, sharing hugs and kisses while at the beach in the Caribbean on Sunday.

Lourd, 24, couldnt seem to keep her hands off her 25-year-old boyfriend as they swam through the ocean waves and took a stroll alongthe beach in St. Maarten, Dutch West Indies.

TheScream Queenscostars began their relationship shortly before the deaths of Lourds mother Carrie Fisher and grandmother Debbie Reynolds in December.

TheTwilight actor has been a source of strength and comfort for Lourd.

Lautner sported a baseball cap, grey T-shirt and maroon swimming trunks. His girlfriend opted for striped maroon shorts over a black and white striped one-piece bathing suit.

FROM COINAGE:Vacation Like a Kardashian: Heres How Much It Will Cost You

On Saturday, Lautner posted a photo on his Instagram account from an aerial perspective of where the couple was enjoying some downtime, captioned: #nofilter #blasontheoutsideblessedontheinside #hashtagthief.

The two were joined on their vacation by Lourds dad, CAA co-chairman Bryan Lourd, and her stepdad, Bruce Bozzi.

Bozzi also posted a photo on Instagram, capturing their family in a snapshot wearing face masks and writing, The family that masks together lasts together! Hello 4/3/17 #fresh #relax @praisethelourd.

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Billie Lourd and Taylor Lautner Enjoy a PDA-Filled Caribbean Getaway - PEOPLE.com

By Joy Moton | Staff Writer

Every year, thousands of people leave the clear water and sandy beaches of the Caribbean islands to enter America.

Houston junior Darnelle DesVignes is from Trinidad and Tobago, an island off the coast of Venezuela. DesVignes said the Caribbean is just a melting pot of different cultures.

Their festivals, food, clothes, music is all a collaboration of different cultures, DesVignes said.

DesVignes described Trinidad and Tobago as a place where people are more focused on their similarities than their differences. Coming to America was a culture shock for her because America was described as a big melting pot and, coming from another melting pot, she said she thought it would be the same.

In Trinidad, we have people who are Chinese, black, Spanish, French, Indian, and we dont categorize ourselves into different categories-you are just Trinidadian, DesVignes said. In America, you are black or youre white. Theres no mixing of different cultures-theres just separation.

New York junior Elissa Arthur, originally from Trinidad and Tobago, is a community leader in North Russell Hall. She said being a community leader at Baylor has good and bad to it. A downside has been dealing with people who do not understand what it means to be Trinidadian. She said it can be hard to explain a culture people have not been very exposed to.

Ive struggled so much with expressing my culture and struggling with making people understand who I am as a Trinidadian that Ive kind of molded my events to show who I am, Arthur said.

Last year, Arthur hosted events where she taught her residents how to cook jerk chicken and hosted a game where she spoke in an accent and residents had to figure out what she was saying.

I think that allowed the other community leaders on my staff and residents to say, Oh being Trinidadian is cool, I want to learn about Elissas culture. It also exposed them to who I was, so it made me easier to understand, Arthur said.

Baylor Alumna and Miss Green and Gold 2017 Amanda Plummer is from Jamaica and appreciates the way people from the country are family oriented and respectful of each other. Although she has family that is still in Jamaica, she said she tries to view both sides of the spectrum where immigration is concerned.

I understand the side of wanting to come here for freedom and having better opportunities than the country that you currently reside in, but I also understand the side of people coming illegally and all the negative things that happen with that, Plummer said.

Plummer said there is nothing wrong with people wanting to emigrate to another country until they go about it the wrong way. Plummer believes that immigration is an issue because it is not being dealt with correctly.

The issue is not that people are or that we need to get them out, its the process of how its done, and if we do want them to leave, that process needs to be correct too, Plummer said.

Plummer said America is seen as land of the free, but people also do not realize the amount of chaos that comes with that freedom.

When you have so many people without rules and so many people from different cultures coming to this place where they feel like they can do what they want, then it calls for this melting pot of craziness, Plummer said.

DesVignes said immigration is a good thing because it has the power to unify and diversify a country at the same time. She said preventing it would take away the concept of America as the melting pot.

There is no cookie cutter layout for what an American should look like, believe in or act upon. There is no blueprint of what America should look like. Immigration reform looks like removing the bans and walls that separate us from other countries so that we may hear and see their struggles and identify them as our own, Desvignes said.

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Caribbean students talk immigration and life in America - The Baylor Lariat

WASHINGTON, United States, Sunday April 9, 2017 Amid concerns about high spending by some Caribbean governments, the World Bank says theres nothing wrong with spending. But rather than spend more, they need to spend better.

It says Latin America and the Caribbean can dramatically improve its infrastructure by better assessing priorities and improving spending efficiency.

In an April 7 report titled Rethinking Infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean Spending Better to Achieve More, the World Bank argues that although the region trails others in infrastructure investment, it should focus on spending better before thinking of spending more.

While Latin America and the Caribbean spends 3 percent of GDP on average compared to 7.7 percent in East Asia and Pacific for instance many countries spend more than 4 percent.

Infrastructure investment can be a powerful engine for growth in Latin America and the Caribbean as the region emerges from six years of slowdown, including two of recession, said Jorge Familiar, World Bank Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean. In todays tight fiscal context, it is essential that investments are as efficient as possible, and that the full potential of the private sector be tapped.

Rather than focusing on often poorly defined financing gaps, the report advocates for addressing service gaps, according to countries development priorities. This means putting in place efficient ways of addressing these needs, and developing clear rules for deciding when taxpayers should finance services, instead of users.

Improving performance in a constrained fiscal environment will require well-identified priorities. The report singles out sanitation and transport, in which Latin America and the Caribbean lags behind other middle-income regions, as potential focus areas. In addition, the region should also factor concerns such as climate change, urbanization and its changing socioeconomic profile, in particular a larger middle class, which are changing infrastructure service demands especially on energy and transport.

Latin America and the Caribbean has long been an innovator in infrastructure, said Marianne Fay, Chief Economist for the World Banks Sustainable Development Vice-Presidency, and one of the authors of the report. With its expertise in sophisticated regulations and its experience with public-private partnerships, the region has the means to improve its infrastructure services by spending better and on the right things.

Spending more efficiently could have enormous benefits. In the case of the energy sector, where transmission and distribution losses are high, Latin America and the Caribbean would need $23 billion per year if it were to follow the same investment path of the past. Costs would at least halve under an approach that favors efficiency, climate resiliency and renewable energy solutions.

According to the report, many of the causes for inefficient infrastructure investment have roots beyond the sector, including lack of institutional capacity for planning, regulatory uncertainty, and budgeting and implementation issues in many countries. Inefficient procurement processes, for instance, contribute to excess costs. Adequate pricing for infrastructure services is another important potential area for increased efficiency.

The report argues that pricing should go beyond simple cost recovery and take into account issues like social acceptability, quality, equity and attraction of commercial financing. In order to preserve taxpayers money, the report says that public and concessional resources should only be deployed where commercial financing is not viable or cost-effective.

Finally, the report concludes that allowing infrastructure operators to diversify their revenue can contribute to easing the fiscal cost. Water treatment plants, for instance, can generate electricity for self-consumption and even sale, and sanitized sludge can be sold as fertilizer, instead of having to be disposed at high cost in sanitary landfills, options not currently available.

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