At the Twenty-Fourth Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of CARICOM held in Montego Bay, Jamaica, 2-5 July 2003, the Heads of Government established a Task Fore on Energy to develop a Community Energy Policy to address inter alia issues raised in relation access to lower priced Natural Gas produced in Trinidad and Tobago, at similar prices available to local consumers. The Task Force was also mandated to develop recommendations for a Regional Energy Policy, which would address issues such as security of energy supplies, energy pricing policy and the impact on relative competitiveness in the CARICOM Single Market and Economy, and purchasing and transportation arrangements. The Task Force comprised of Barbados, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago
The Terms of Reference for the Task Force was later expanded in 2003, to include issues relating to Natural Gas, Renewable Energy, Investment requirements and coordinated investments in the Regional energy sector; Energy Efficiency; Environmental Impact and Rationalisation of the Regional Energy Sector. It was also decided to refer the issue of the national treatment and non-discrimination in respect of access to, and pricing of natural resources as these relate to energy within the context of the CSME, to the Secretary-General of the Caribbean Community for an advisory legal opinion.
The Task Force on Energy submitted its report of a Draft CARICOM Energy Policy to the Eighteenth Inter-Sessional Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government, held in Kingstown, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, 12-14 February 2007. Effectively the Task Force on Energy was thereafter dissolved with subsequent work for finalizing the CARICOM Policy falling to CARICOM Energy Programme established in 2008.
