Another factor that currently determines the situation in Saint Martin is that the people of Saint Martin have come to the realization that the present constitutional structure of the Netherlands Antilles cannot serve their quest for socio-economic development and self-determination. This realization has led to the people of Saint Martin voting by an overwhelming 69.9% for Saint Martin becoming a country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands at the June 23, 2000 consultative referendum held under supervision and guidance of the United Nations. The right of self-determination of each island territory of the Netherlands Antilles was acknowledged and accepted by all persons in the Kingdom at the joint conference held in The Hague, The Netherlands in March 1983.

Strategies geared toward economic development within the Netherlands Antilles have always been determined by what stimulates economic growth for the island of Curacao. Within the international arena, many organizations and associations do not comprehend the diversity of islands e.g. social, economic, political, and cultural differences, within the Netherlands Antilles and have very little insight as to the contribution of the individual islands (Saint Martin in particular) to the economic indicators comprising the trends of the economy. It is therefore of utmost importance for Saint Martin at this point to set out a comprehensive strategy for the economic development and growth. In this context, the Government, by means of public and private sector discussions and assistance from the World Bank and the Foreign Investment Advisory Service has further developed the shared vision as presented in the Multi-Annual Policy Plan (MAPP), into concrete economic policies and strategies. These policies and strategies are presented in a Comprehensive Economic Development Plan (CEDP). The Comprehensive EDP is to ensure economic opportunities and growth as well as a better quality of life for all the people of Saint Martin.

The Comprehensive Economic Development Plan (CEDP) proposes policies, strategies, programs and ultimately projects to get Saint Martin back to a prosperous business climate, which, stimulates economic development and growth by applying a two-prong approach:
   1) Redevelopment of the tourism sector, and
   2) Diversification of the economy

In addressing the redevelopment of the tourism sector and the diversifying of the economy by developing other economic pillars next to tourism, however, call for investment in improving the basic living conditions for both the people of Saint Martin and the over one million annual visitors to the island, thereby respectively improving their quality of life as well as heightening their visitor’s experience.

The infrastructural projects that need to be emphasized are the road network improvements and the sewage and waste management. It is well known that construction is the best economic “jump-starter”. It creates jobs immediately and induces high short-term income effects.
Also due to the many lessons learned from the challenges faced after the passings of the hurricanes of the ‘90s, underground cabling for all utilities lines and proper drainage of water can be highlighted as basic preconditions to guarantee the shortest and least expensive recovery for the island’s economy after the passing of a hurricane.
While the focus of the CEDP is on defining the economic pillars of the island’s economy and the strategies to be implemented to achieve sustainable economic development, the aforementioned preconditions need to be simultaneously funded.

Redevelopment of the tourism sector:
The approach to redevelop the mainstay of Saint Martins’ economy is through firstly enhancing the business climate by:

• Identifying and dismantling all obstacles to tourism-related investments (includes indirect activities that support tourism)
• Streamlining the registration process for new companies and expatriate labor, immigrations and work permit processes
• Creating the conditions that will provide the platforms for specific kinds of tourism development e.g. restoration of monuments, establishment of nature parks, stimulating the marine industry, etc.

The second method of redevelopment, is the repositioning of the island within the region by concerted efforts to redevelop the marketing mix applied towards the tourism industry with major emphasis on product development in terms of both the physical development of the island and the human resource development. In this context, Saint Martin is in the process of writing a Tourism Master Plan.

Diversification of the economy
The approach of diversification is of a twofold nature, namely:
Diversification within the tourism sector thereby identifying what other types of industries within the tourism sectors can be developed and determine the infrastructure needed and the marketing strategy to stimulate those identified sectors i.e. marina/yachting, conference/group travel, etc..
Diversification geared towards expanding the economic basis by focusing on the development of other economic sectors, e.g. development of the IT-sector.

• Areas of economic diversification presented in the CEDP are the following:
  development of the IT-sector
     i. e-business related industries
     ii. trade center services
     iii. learning centers
• regional distribution center for trade, information and services
• light manufacturing possibly in conjunction with the island of St. Eustatius

The overall objective of the CEDP is sustainable economic development. The intention is to have clear transparent economic policies fitting into two larger frameworks. The first is the Multi-Annual Policy Plan and the Government Program of the Island Government of Saint Martin 1999-2003, and the second is the Netherlands Antilles Economic Development Program consisting of 5 island programs and a Central Government Program. Within the discussion of the island’s plans it will be emphasized that Saint Martin would prefer to keep their CEDP apart from the Central Government program seeing that the transfer of all authority to the country Saint Martin has been dated to take place in April 2002. Also the discussion for the financial institutional framework for the funding of the projects presented in the CEDP should be approached from said point of departure.

The structure of the CEDP
Two points of departures were utilized to structure the CEDP:
The classification system utilized by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB-strategy) in their report of 1997, consisting of:

Part I
Providing a global overview of the plan and containing a main program and a description of structure, objectives, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the Comprehensive Economic Development Plan, programs and projects.

Part II
In part II the Comprehensive Economic Development Plan is divided into four sub-policy programs or sub-sectors geared towards:

A. Preserving macro-economic stability and social cohesion

B. Fostering an enabling business environment

C. Facilitating development in productive sectors in order to stimulate a number of economic sectors to jump-start economic recovery

D. Developing the necessary supporting policies.
For each of them the same structure is applied: 1) summary, 2) background information 3) government policy and indicators and 4) objectives and content.
The combination of these four pillars is expected to constitute a broad and sufficiently complete plan of action to attain the objective of sustainable economic development and growth for the island territory of Saint Martin.

The logical framework recognized and accepted by international funding agencies when requesting financing for development programs/projects.

The financing needs to implement the EDP are ANG. 92,017,000 million. It is estimated that ANG. … million will be island government contribution, ANG. … million private sector financing and ANG. … million donor funding. Of course these numbers are indicative and are subject to further analysis.

Assumptions and risks
Assumptions underlying and risks associated with the program are explicitly identified. It is important to identify and address each one of these explicitly to prevent them from endangering the progress of the program implementation. Three main groups of assumptions and risks that have been identified in successfully implementing the EDP are:

• The soundness and structure of the program;
• The interfaces the program has with ‘the outside environment’;
• The availability of donor funding.

Implementation of the CEDP
The implementation of the CEDP remains ultimately the responsibility of the Executive Council of the Island Territory of Saint Martin.
However, a Steering Committee consisting of the Commissioner of Economic Affairs and Tourism, the Commissioner of Finance and the Commissioner of Development Cooperation and their respective Sector Directors will be put in charge of the monitoring, coordination and evaluation of the CEDP. The Steering Committee has to guarantee the successful implementation of the CEDP. The committee will steer the progress of the implementation progress and prioritize the sequence of projects within the CEDP The Steering committee will be supported by a project team/staff bureau within the Sector E/T consisting of permanent staff of the sector, revolving staff of other sectors and the private sector project coordinator depending on the nature of the project(s) in question. A team of private sector experts, an Advisory committee, will also support the Steering committee.