The development of the Social Economic Council (SER) crossed another threshold by the induction of the organization into the AICESIS last week in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The International Association of Economic and Social Councils and Similar Institutions or AICESIS is a worldwide organization uniting 70 member states from 4 continents.The SER was inducted into this international forum at its annual General Assembly that took place in Rio de Janeiro on June 14 and 15. A delegation comprised of 4 members of the Sint Maarten SER traveled to Brazil as acceptance of the membership required the live attendance of SER representatives at the conference. The Sint Maarten delegation included chairman René Richardson and members Dwight Williams, Joseph Lake jr. and Edwin Smith.
In a presentation to an audience of more than 200 delegates from different member states, SER chairman Richardson made use of the opportunity to relay some basic information about our country and its Social Economic Council. The membership seemed very impressed by the combination of the flowing informative speech by the Chairman and display via PowerPoint. A panoramic picture of Great Bay caught the attention from those members in attendance for the several minutes it was displayed. The general secretary of AICESIS then made gesture for the membership, which provided loud applause confirming both appreciation for the presentation and Sint Maarten's acceptance in the association.
Concurrent with Sint Maarten, Aruba and El Salvador were accepted as new AICESIS members as well. In the corridors of the conference, the Sint Maarten delegation took the opportunity to strengthen its ties with the Kingdom sister organizations from Aruba, Curaçao and the Netherlands.
Additional information of the AICESIS including the membership list that now mentions Sint Maarten is to be found at www.aicesis.org.
The cost involved in the SER trip to the AICESIS General Assembly was covered by Dutch cooperation funds managed by USONA.