The participants discussed the issues of cooperative policy, cooperative legislation and cooperative entrepreneurship, and adopted the following recommendations:

1. CARICOM should design common cooperative development strategies which its member States can translate into national cooperative development policies.
2. CARICOM should pursue its efforts to harmonize cooperative legislation throughout the Caribbean region; where feasible, preference should be given to the design of omnibus cooperative acts which may however contain separate sections for specific types of cooperatives, such as credit unions. Governments should formulate and adopt regulations at the same time as cooperative acts.
3. The role of the State in cooperative development should be confined to regulation and inspection. All other functions, in particular the developmental and promotional activities, should be carried out by the cooperative movement and development partners.
4. All countries in the region should make special efforts to promote all types of cooperatives, including those that are not involved in the provision of financial services.
5. All governments in the Caribbean region should give prominence to the term "cooperative" in the name of the relevant ministry, and should raise the awareness of government officials about the development potential of cooperatives.
6. The cooperative movements in the Caribbean region should strengthen collaboration and cooperation at regional level.
7. All relevant training institutions in the region should strive for the integration of cooperative entrepreneurship into existing curricula.
8. Cooperative legislation in the Caribbean should ensure the creation of a permanent share capital base that is distinct from savings, so as to foster the continued viability, stability and economic strength of the cooperative organizations.
9. Governments, cooperative movements, trade unions and employers' organizations in the Caribbean should develop a coherent and integrated strategy to promote job creation by cooperatives.
10. The Ministers of Labour of all ILO Member States in the Caribbean should ensure that the questionnaire attached to the ILO report "Promotion of Cooperatives" is returned to the ILO before 30 June 2000.
11. Steps should be taken to henceforth organize Conferences of the Ministers of Cooperatives of the Caribbean on a regular basis.

The participants thanked the Government, cooperative movement and people of Saint Lucia for their warm hospitality and perfect organization of the conference, and the CCCU and the ILO for their technical and financial support to the event. They further requested the ILO to assist in the implementation of the above recommendations.