Prime Minister Gaston Browne has urged the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States to adopt a far more proactive strategy toward Latin America, arguing that commercial ties between the sub-region and its 447 million Spanish-speaking neighbours remain underdeveloped given their geographic proximity and economic scale.

According to Antigua.news, Browne made the appeal during his address as incoming chairman of the OECS Authority at the organisation's 78th meeting, held at the Royalton Resort on Sunday.

Addressing fellow heads of government, Browne noted that the OECS, with a population of approximately 625,000, sits within a CARICOM bloc of roughly 17 million people. Yet the broader hemisphere to the south and west represents a market 40 times the size of CARICOM — one with which trade remains largely underdeveloped.

"We must develop a far more proactive strategy toward our Latin American neighbourhood," Browne told delegates, adding that this should include greater Spanish-language fluency among OECS nationals and officials.

The Prime Minister singled out Panama for particular attention, citing the Panama Canal's more than US$33 billion in annual trade volume and the Colón Free Trade Zone as critical infrastructure the OECS could leverage. He proposed using Panama as a transshipment point while building sourcing partnerships with Central American producers — an approach he argued could fundamentally reduce the cost of living and strengthen regional resilience.

"An OECS strategy that builds sourcing partnerships with Central American producers, uses Panama as a transshipment point, and develops shared regional emergency stockpiles could fundamentally reduce our cost of living and transform our resilience," Browne said.

He further argued that reducing the OECS's overdependence on a single dominant input market was essential, and that Panama offered a natural gateway for alternative sourcing across Central America, South America and the Asia-Pacific region. He noted that the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean has consistently recommended that Caribbean nations build trade partnerships with Latin American counterparts to capitalise on regional value chains.

The Latin America initiative formed one part of a broader set of priorities Browne outlined for his tenure as chairman. These included a proposal for a jointly owned OECS airline to be funded through unclaimed deposits held at the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, equity participation in regional geothermal energy projects, and a directive for the OECS Commission to develop a blue economy investment portfolio within six months.

Antigua assumes the OECS Authority chairmanship from St. Vincent and the Grenadines' Prime Minister Dr. Godwin Friday for a one-year term. The meeting also marked 45 years since the signing of the original Treaty of Basseterre on June 18, 1981.