Senator the Honourable Lisa R. Cummins

Mrs. Lisa R. Cummins was in July 2020 invited to join the Cabinet of Barbados as Minister of Tourism and International Transport after being appointed in May 2018 to October 2022 as a Senator in the Upper House of Parliament. From September 2018 until her appointment to Cabinet, she served as Chairman of the Barbados Port Inc. Presently, Lisa serves as the Minister of Energy and Business Development.

She served as Executive Director of the University of the West Indies Consulting Company from April 2016 to July 2020 which was rebranded Lumin Consulting in celebration of Caribbean Luminaries and Laureates in all development disciplines. A former career diplomat for ten years from 1997 to 2008, she served at the Headquarters of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade where she covered the United Nations and then was posted to the Barbados Embassy in Washington DC.

An International Trade Specialist by training, she was recruited by the Commonwealth Secretariat in 2008 as a Trade Policy Adviser and posted to Kampala, Uganda as lead technical adviser and a member of the negotiating team for services in the East African Community trade talks with Europe and the EAC Common Market where she worked on projects in East and Southern Africa for several development partners including the World Bank, UNCTAD, the European Union and Trade Mark East Africa which included the development of a services policy for Uganda, the development of standards for export goods to Europe, the Introduction of a Value Creation Program for Vanilla Bean producers. She also led the negotiations for Uganda at the World Trade Organisation for the successfully concluded WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement.

Mrs. Cummins returned to Barbados to head the Barbados Coalition of Service Industries, the umbrella body for the services sector from 2013 to 2018 where she led the development of services standards for trade in services sectors, was a founding member of the Caribbean Coalition of Services Industries, developed training programs for service providers, advised on the implementation of the Services Chapter, in particular, the free movement of persons of the Economic Partnership Agreement of the CARIFORUM/EU and served on the national negotiating team for Services and Investment in the CARICOM – Canada Trade Negotiations.

She has supported private sector development and trade policy development in multiple capacities, including appointments to Boards, Bridgetown Cruise Terminal Inc., and two Private Sector Corporate Boards. Senator Cummins presently sits on the Advisory Board of the Shridath Ramphal Centre for Trade Law and Policy. She previously served as the Chairman of the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO) and Vice President of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) Commission for the Americas.

The holder of an undergraduate degree in International Relations and Diplomacy (UWI Mona) a Master of Science in International Trade Policy (UWI Cave Hill) and a post graduate certificate in professional education from the Harvard Kennedy School of Public Policy on Public Private Partnerships.

She is married, a Past President of the Rotary Club of Barbados, and past Assistant District Governor of Barbados for Rotary Regional District 7030, and the proud mother of a 23-year-old daughter.