Above: Port of Spain (CJ Photo)

By the Caribbean Journal staff

The Caribbean Community says it has begun work toward creating a “harmonized framework” for business rules in the CARICOM Single Market.

The framework would be one “within which companies and other businesses can be established and operate,” the regional body said.

CARICOM said the region’s leaders gave this mandate to “ensure that the rules for establishing and operating businesses in one country apply throughout the CSME.”

Consultant BKP Development Research and Consulting, in consortium with AESA, has been awarded the contract to strengthen the regional body’s regulatory and market regimes.

The two-year consultancy began last month, supported by funding from the European Union. It will be completed by July of 2016.

CARICOM said that it would also put in place systems and practices for business complaints administration and the determination of competition disputes, with an additional emphasis on consumer protection within the single market.