CASTRIES, St Lucia (CMC) — The resilience of developing countries is being examined at a conference here as the London-based Commonwealth Secretariat seeks ways to help small island developing states (SIDS) deal with the myriad of challenges facing them.

Commonwealth Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) Tuesday that the third Global Biennial Conference on Small States provides an opportunity for senior government representatives, academics and officials from regional and international organisations to discuss key development concerns of small states, share practical lessons and policy options.

“Small states tend to get marginalised in international discourse. It is the intent traditionally of the Commonwealth both through advocacy of saying things that must be said. That outcome in international trade, finance and economic discourse has to be equal to everybody.

“We are trying to be very practical in this, if you disaggregate all the problems that are contributing to the vulnerability of the states then you have very specific assignments which you can give yourself,” he told CMC.

“We are very strong in the Commonwealth in developing the idea of vulnerability and what it consists of. It’s more than poverty. Middle income states can also be very vulnerable states because of the effect which the global context is having on them.

“Whether it’s finance or fuel or environment or any other form of pressure on them, which means pressure on health and education,” Sharma said.

The two-day conference, which began yesterday under the theme ‘Building Resilience in Small States’, is focusing on five key pillars of resilience building such as macro-economic stability; micro-economic market efficiency; good governance; social development and cohesion; and sound environmental management.

It will also allow for the concerns of small states to be highlighted in international agencies and with donors, according to the Commonweath Secretariat.

It said the conference was established to provide an international forum at which a comprehensive range of development issues for small states can be discussed.

In February, the United Nations designated 2014 as the International Year of Small Island Developing States and Samoa will host a SIDS conference in September.

But Sharma maintains that while “a one size fit all solution” can be applied, it can’t be the order of the day in dealing with SIDS problems.

“The solutions which we are proposing apply to everybody. How it works in detail is another matter, because when you get to the fine-tuning of how you want to access (for example) funds or your debt settlements…how much readjustment has to take place, that depends on the national circumstance of each country. To that extent it is customised if you want it individualised, but the scheme applies to everybody, and the principle is common.”

Seychelles Foreign Minister Jean Paul Adam told CMC that he is hoping “to see real recognition from the Commonwealth, which needs to be taken to all other international financial institutions of the key specificity of the islands.

“Now this will be recognising ways in which we could tackle the debt, recognising the realities of countries. Secondly, recognising the vulnerability of islands and developing some sort of resilient index which we can use to better support these countries. We cannot have a one size fit all, we have to have an approach which looks at the realities of these countries,” he said.

Sharma said the conference comes “at the right time” to review priorities for small states for the Samoa conference and in the post-2015 development framework in the context of resilience building.

“The two meetings we are having now, the 10 ministerial level open-ended working group, will feed immediately into the other meeting tomorrow (Wednesday) which is the third meeting of the global small states, and subsequently it will also feed into the UN process and the SIDS process.

“We would like very much in the new dispensation in what’s being called sustainable development goals for the particular angles, considerations and concerns of the small states to be reflected more fully than was the case in the previous millennium development goals,” he said.

Officials are hoping that at the end of the conference a statement containing key messages from the smaller member states will be compiled and brought to the attention of the international community.