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Country Profiles

Forum Helps Private Sector Address HIV/AIDS in Workplace, Supports Public and Private Partnerships

group photo of participants
JULY 2007 — An 11-member delegation from USAID/GHARP and the Private Sector Advisory Board attended the 2nd Pan Caribbean Business Coalition Forum in Trinidad on June 7 to facilitate a structured Caribbean business response to mitigating the impact of HIV/AIDS in the workplace. The forum sought to bring together private-sector champions and national business coalitions on HIV/AIDS to reduce stigma and discrimination in the workplace and adopt prevention and treatment strategies that promote private and public partnerships.

The GHARP project, led by Family Health International (FHI), has worked for the past two years with its lead private-sector partner, Howard Delafield International, to develop and organize what is now the largest and most robust public- and private-sector business coalition on HIV/AIDS in the Pan Caribbean region.

Since developing the initial strategy in 2005, the GHARP team has engaged 43 entities in a variety of private-sector initiatives, including workplace programs, education, and policy development. Implementation campaigns aim to lessen stigma and discrimination, promote peer education, and link workers with voluntary counseling and testing and programs that reduce mother-to-child transmission of HIV.

The delegation was jointly led by Advisory Board Chair and Country Manager Amanda Jairam, Scotiabank, and Chief of Party Kwame Asiedu, USAID/GHARP.

PHOTO: Front row L-R: Janet Abbensetts, Guyana Revenue Authority; Gwen King, USAID/GHARP; Jackie Mendes, Farfan & Mendes; Sharon Tong, Guyana Lottery Co. Ltd.; Amanda Jairam, Scotiabank; Islamun Mohamed, Caricom Rice Mills. Back row L-R: Derrick Cummings, USAID/GHARP; Niaiol Paul, Institute of Private Enterprise Development; Kwame Asiedu, USAID/GHARP; Sir George Alleyne, UN Special Envoy of the Secretary General for HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean, Chancellor of UWI, Director Emeritus of PAHO; Denise Thompson, Citizen's Bank Guyana Inc.; Terry Holder, Guyana Telephone & Telegraph Co.;  and Carol Ayoung, CEO, Caribbean Association of Industry and Commerce. (David Gasser)