Canada’s Parliamentary Secretary Visits Jamaica and Presents Canada’s Feminist International Policy

On Monday, July 10 at 2:00 p.m. at the University of the West Indies Regional Headquarters, Canada’s Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Development, Grenada-born Mrs. Celina Caesar-Chavannes will introduce us to Canada’s new Feminist International Assistance Policy. This is a partnership with the Caribbean Policy Research Institute (CaPRI). It should be very interesting! Here is the joint press release:

For immediate release

Canada’s Parliamentary Secretary Visits Jamaica and Presents Canada’s Feminist International Policy

Kingston, Jamaica – July 7, 2017 – Canada’s Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Development Mrs. Celina Caesar-Chavannes will visit Jamaica from July 9 to 11, 2017.

During Mrs. Caesar-Chavannes’ visit to Jamaica, the High Commission of Canada in Jamaica will partner with the Caribbean Policy Research Institute (CAPRI) to introduce Canada’s new Feminist International Assistance Policy. The event will be held at 2 pm., on Monday, July 10, at the University of the West Indies’ Regional Headquarters.

This event will provide a platform for the Parliamentary Secretary to introduce the new policy, which is designed to advance gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

A discussion will follow the presentation, led by two discussants: Mrs. Sharon Coburn Robinson, Director, Policy and Research, Jamaica’s Bureau of Gender Affairs, and Dr. Adwoa Onuora, Lecturer at UWI’s Institute of Gender and Development Studies and an Affiliate Researcher of CAPRI, currently working on a project focused on the care economy and womens’ economic empowerment.

Both discussants will comment on Canada’s new policy in the context of Jamaica’s National Policy for Gender Equality. Questions and comments from the floor will follow.

Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy builds on evidence gathered during the 2016 International Assistance Review. As part of the review, the government consulted with Canadian NGOs, donor and partner governments, youth, and experts in the field of international assistance. Canada will continue to engage these domestic and international partners to effectively implement the new policy.

Contacts:

High Commission of Canada in Jamaica
Public Affairs Section
Telephone: 733-3253
Email: carol.hart@international.gc.caCaribbean Policy Research Institute
Telephone: 789-4323
E-mail: communications@capricaribbean.org

Biography of Mrs. Celina Caesar-Chavannes

Celina Caesar-Chavannes
Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development
(Member of Parliament – Whitby)

Celina Caesar-Chavannes is a successful entrepreneur and the recipient of both the Toronto Board of Trade’s Business Entrepreneur of the Year for 2012 and the 2007 Black Business and Professional Association’s Harry Jerome Young Entrepreneur Award. Ms. Caesar-Chavannes was a well-known research consultant and worked with a variety of private, government and non-government organizations.

An international lecturer on the inclusion of marginalized populations in clinical research, Ms. Caesar-Chavannes has a Bachelor of Science from the University of Toronto, an MBA in Healthcare Management, and an Executive MBA from the Rotman School of Management. She is a past member of the Governing Council of the University of Toronto. She also served as member of the Institutional Advisory Board of the Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction, part of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. She is also a member of the Congress of Black Women.

Ms. Caesar-Chavannes served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister from December 2015 to January 2017.

Ms. Caesar-Chavannes was born in Grenada, and subsequently immigrated to Canada. She has deep roots in Whitby, where she lives with her husband and three children.