Prime Minister Bruce Golding yesterday proposed the establishment of a team to explore trading opportunities and their supporting transportation arrangements among countries benefiting from Venezuela’s PetroCaribe deal, Jamaica House said last night.

Golding made the suggestion at the working session of the fourth PetroCaribe Summit in Cienfuegos, Cuba.

He said he was pleased to see how the group was putting emphasis on expanding the opportunities for trade among member countries of PetroCaribe, adding that this was another important area where “we can build co-operation and create areas of mutual benefit”.

However, he said there was an area of challenge, which was the question of the transportation of goods among member countries as we do not have cost-effective means of transportation.

He said that while it may be important for member countries of PetroCaribe to expand their co-operation beyond the question of energy, there was also the need to look at what was happening now, not just in terms of the movement in oil prices, but what was happening with the movement in commodity prices.

Golding told the delegates that it goes beyond the question of oil prices because it impacts significantly on the economies of the region. He noted that just recently Caricom heads of government had to get together to look at the implications of price increases and the threat that these increases could impose in destabilising the economies of the region.

He said it may be useful, with the kind of umbrella organisation that PetroCaribe is, to look at this “because it could undermine much of the effort member countries are making to use this agreement to stimulate economic growth”, the Jamaica House release reported.

Golding also said it may also be useful to see if there was some joint initiative that could come out of PetroCaribe to help countries to address this concern.

The PetroCaribe Agreement represents the strengthening of relations between Venezuela and the countries of the Caribbean by providing significant support to the petroleum industry in the face of rising oil prices.

The summit ended late yesterday with opening of the Camilo Cienfuegos Refinery.

Golding was scheduled to return to the island yesterday evening.