High school students of Mount Carmel who attended the summit said it was timely as they are discussing the economy in their speech class.
Accompanied by their former principal Galvin S. Deleon Guerrero, nine MCS students including 10th grader Kevin Bautista and 12th grader Rachel Kim occupied one of the tables during the summit and took notes during discussions.
Deleon Guerrero said the students attended the summit so they can learn more about the economy.
Bautista said he is aware that the economy right now is a very big issue in the CNMI.
“So we want to learn more about what we can do to stabilize it and how to make it recover and bounce back from the industry that we just lost,” he said referring to garment manufacturing.
Bautista said they also want to know the solutions to the islands’ financial problems, and what is needed to create a more stable economy in the commonwealth.
Right now, he believes the CNMI should focus on agriculture and aquaculture.
Kim said she knows it’s kind of hard for the CNMI to start all over again.
“But if we want to improve our economy we have to start somewhere. And that somewhere has to be the beginning. We have no choice,” she said.
Kim said the economic summit, which was first discussed last December, should have been done before.
“It’s kind of sad how we’ve been waiting for the economy to drop before we realize we’ve to do something about it. That’s kind of bad because I’ve seen the changes going on and they’re really bad. So we should have just kept the economy going well even before. It’s sad that we have to wait for this time to come before we realize that,” she said.
