·       Prof. Rose‑Marie Belle Antoine, Campus Principal, UWI STA Campus

Executive Director of the Artificial Intelligence Innovation Centre and Head of the Control Systems Group in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of the West Indies, St. Augustine and Chair, CTU Caribbean AI Task Force

Founding Member, World Digital Governance (WDG)

Minister of Public Administration and AI, Trinidad and Tobago and President, Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU

Dr. Craig Ramlal

Mr. Nigel Cassimire

Presentation: AI Governance and Considerations for Small States

Panel: Turning the Work of the CAITF into Collective Action

About Panel: A focused discussion with senior policymakers and decision makers to convert CAITF recommendations into a regionally led implementation agenda; panelists give brief positions followed by targeted dialogue to recommend pilot initiatives suitable for small states.

H.E. Ren Hongyan, Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China to Trinidad and Tobago

Panelists:

·       Senator the Honourable Dominic Smith

·       H.E. Guillaume Pierre, Ambassador of the French Republic to Trinidad and Tobago

·       Dr. Craig Ramlal, Chair – CAITF & Director AIIC

About Panel: A targeted discussion with senior policymakers, practitioners, and researchers to review national AI movements across the Caribbean, surface practical trends and lessons learnt, and identify three scalable, low-cost opportunities plus a short roadmap for regional knowledge sharing, capacity building, and policy harmonization.

Panelists:

·       Mr. Christopher Reckord, Chair of the National AI Task Force, Jamaica (Remote)

·       Mr. Atiba Phillips, Board Director, iGoVTT

·       Mr. Vincent Roberts, Chairman and Commissioner, NTRC Grenada

About Panel: Regional decision‑makers, cultural leaders, and creative industry champions examine how AI intersects with culture, creativity, and intellectual property, with a strong emphasis on youth empowerment and job creation. Panelists will identify practical policies and business models to protect creators’ rights, unlock new creative economies, and scale skills pathways for young people, producing three actionable recommendations and pilot initiatives to catalyze youth‑led employment and sustainable creative industries.

Panelists:

·       Dr. Justin Koo, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Law, UWI

·       Jean Marie Altema, ProfIT Development Consulting Executive Manager (Remote)

·       Mr. Keron Rose (Remote)

About Panel: A strategic convening of regional decision‑makers and infrastructure stewards to define practical approaches to data sovereignty, cybersecurity, and resilient AI infrastructure.

Panelists will surface appropriate frameworks for secure local data repositories, shared edge and cloud architectures, procurement safeguards to avoid vendor lock‑in, and a concise action plan with designated focal points for standards, capacity building, and incident‑response coordination.

Panelists:

·       Mr. Tracy Hackshaw, Chef d’ Enterprise, UPU (Remote)

·       Mr. Reza Sookdeo, Chief Information Officer, Heritage Petroleum Limited

·       Mr. Shernon Osepa, Consultant Strategic Advisor and CAITF Coordinator, CTU

·       Mr. Steven Williams, Principal Consultant Data Privacy

·       Mr. Cédric Pradel, Executive Director ACCYB

About Panel: A high-level discussion with senior policy leaders and strategic decisionmakers to anchor Caribbean AI development in humancentric, rights based, and ethical principles; panelists will propose practical safeguards, and a timebound set of policy commitments to protect rights, counter bias, and serve vulnerable communities.

Moderator: Ms. Nia Nanan, Senior Research Analyst, CTU

Panelists:

·       Mr. Cordel Green, Executive Director, Broadcast Commission of Jamaica, Jamaica (Remote)

·       Ms. Sandrea Maynard, Pro Vice-Chancellor UWI

·       Ms. Lily Dash, Founder Future Caribbean

·       Prof. Derrick Cogburn, Professor of Information Technology & Analytics (Kogod School of Business), and Environment, Development & Health (School of International Service) and Executive Director, Institute on Disability and Public Policy, American University

·       Mr. Kevan Rajaram, Manager of Analytics and Information Management at the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) & Researcher (TTLAB)

About Panel: A transformative session convening women leaders, to accelerate women’s leadership in AI across the region. Panelists will identify practical pathways for skills, funding, and entrepreneurship and recommend priority actions to scale women‑led talent, startups, and youth job creation.

Panelists:

·       Ms. Diedre Cousins, CIO GraceKennedy

·       Dr. Maria Myers-Hamilton, Chair CTU Network of Women (Remote)

·       Ms. Amanda Zilla, Co-Chair HerSpace in AI, AIIC, UWI

·       Ms. Julie Koon Koon, Lead Data Scientist, Republic Bank Limited and Lecturer, Bsc Computing, University of Greenwhich (SBCS)

·       Ms. Sarah Rudder-Chulhan, Associate Director, Digital & Client Experience, CIBC

About: The debate invites participants to critically examine the most effective approaches to strengthening cybersecurity and AI governance. Teams are encouraged to consider legal, economic, technological, ethical and public policy perspectives while assessing whether market-driven mechanisms such as cyber insurance create stronger incentives for secure AI systems than traditional regulatory approaches.

·       Ms. Gabrielle Johnson, Vice Chair, Caribbean ICT Youth Network (CIYN), CTU

·       Mr. Andrew Sieupersad, Director, TAIROne Initiative

·       Mr. Terren Finley, President, ISG

·       Mr. Kevon Swift, Past-Chair, ISOC Trinidad and Tobago

Debaters:

Team A (FOR):

·       Mr. Bryan Balkissoon, UWI-GUILD

·       Mr. Mikail Barrock, UWI-GUILD

·       Ms. Samisha Maharaj, UWI-GUILD

·       Mr. Zephion Lee- Harris, UWI-GUILD

Team B (AGAINST):

·       Ms. Shania Sobers, Debate Club Member, UWI-ROYTEC

·       Mr. Ezekiel Renne Cambridge, ISACA Student Member, UWI-ROYTEC

·      Ms. Annalisa Maharaj, Debate Club Member, UWI-ROYTEC

·       Mr. Zacharias Dyer, Vice President, ISACA Student Group, UWI-ROYTEC

12:00

About Panel: A strategic convening on how intergovernmental organizations and multilateral partners can unlock AI for Small Island Developing States by coordinating financing, shared data and computing infrastructure, capacity building, and governance. The panel will define practical partnership models to turn scale constraints into regional advantages and policy recommendations to catalyze resilient, inclusive AI‑driven development.

Panelists:

·       Mr. Ahmed Elraghy, Head RME Division ITU

·       Mr. Ugo Blanco, Resident Representative, UNDP, Trinidad and Tobago, Curacao, Aruba and Sint Maarten, Digital Facility Lead – AI & Emerging Technologies, UNDP

·       Mr. Demetris Herakleous, Associate Economic Affairs Officer, UN ECLAC

·      Ms. Paula Istruiz Cavero, Programme Specialist for Social and Human Sciences, UNESCO

About Panel: In this session panelists will discuss the AI literacy small states need to meet their unique regional challenges and how youth and the wider community should prepare for the future of work. The session will explore practical steps for building local skills, expanding access, aligning education with employers, and fostering community‑wide strategies that make AI an engine for inclusive jobs and resilient economies.

Panelists:

·       Prof. Sean Thorpe, Dean, Faculty of Engineering & Computing, UoT, Jamaica (Remote)

·       Ms. Lois St. Brice, Senior Programme Officer – Strategic Partnerships and Initiatives, Office of Global Affairs | Office of the Vice-Chancellor, UWI

·       Dr. Andrea Kanneh, Manager of Performance and Engagement, MPAAI

About Panel: This session will examine how AI can mitigate the annual disaster risks facing Caribbean states, improving early warning, damage assessment, infrastructure planning, and recovery, and clarify the responsibilities and partnerships needed across institutions to make the region more resilient.

Panelists:

·       Kenneth Kerr, Science and Technology Officer, Caribbean Meteorological Organization (CMO)

·       Dr. Letetia Addison, Deputy Chair, Advisory Board, UWI Disaster Risk Reduction Centre, UWI & Researcher, TTLAB

·       Prof. Derrick Cogburn, Professor of Information Technology & Analytics (Kogod School of Business), and Environment, Development & Health (School of International Service) and Executive Director, Institute on Disability and Public Policy, American University

·       Representative, CDEMA

About Panel: A roundtable discussion convening regional development partners, private sector innovators, to map how AI can accelerate economic development across the Caribbean. The session will prioritize scalable, locally relevant applications, tourism optimization, fintech and financial inclusion, climate‑smart agriculture, public service efficiency, and digital trade, while addressing governance, data, and capacity constraints.

Panelists:

·       Mr. Javed Razack, Vice-President of Shared Services, Ramps Logistics

·       Mr. Riard Mohammed, Regional Manager, Honeywell Caribbean

·       Mrs. Esther Callender-George, Group Chief Information Security Officer, Guardian Group

·       Mr. Mervyn Eyre, Head of Fujitsu Caribbean Operations