The creation of a more efficient legal framework better equipped to facilitate the expansion of the private sector and the acceleration of foreign private investment, the provision of enhanced access to funding for small business development, the realization of an enhanced regime of consumer protection and the realization of tax reforms are among the strategic initiatives targeted by the newly elected Executive Management Committee of the Private Sector Commission (PSC) for 2010.
Stabroek Business has received a copy of a 0recent presentation made by the PSC in which it outlines a raft of measures which it seeks to pursue this years within the framework of the National Competi-tiveness Strategy. The PSC says that it will be seeking to implementation of a new legal framework that will embrace the removal of redundant laws, the re-fashioning of laws governing the close of businesses, the creation of e-legislation and the streamlining of the local commercial court. Additionally, the PSC’s submission embodies emphasis on the establishment of a Competition and Consumers’ Protection Commission and the creation of a Small Business Development Fund and a Credit Bureau.
The new PSC Executive Committee has also listed the long-outstanding issue of tax reform and the improvement of port facilities as being among its key strategic initiatives this year while it also targets the creation of strategic partnerships with regional and international organizations as another of its goals for 2010.
The PSC’s new 5-member Executive Management Committee comprises Banks DIH Executive Ramesh Dookhoo who last month replaced Roraima Group of Companies Chief Executive Officer Captain Gerry Gouveia as Chairman of the Commission, Guyana Tele-phone and Telegraph Com-pany Chief Financial Officer Yog Mahadeo who now serves as Vice Chairman, Honorary Secretary Andrew Astwood, Honarary Treasurer Chandradat Chintamani and Executive Director Roubinder Rambarran.
While the new PSC management team has signaled its intention to continue to work within the framework of the National Competitiveness Council this year the Com-mission has also signaled its intention to seek to strengthen trade and commercial ties with several countries in the region. Under its raft of “sttategic initiatives” for this year it says it will be seeking to facilitate international trade fairs to Brazil, Venezuela and the Dominican Republic this year.
Established in 1992 under the Companies Act of Guyana the PSC has among its members local private sector organizations involved in a range of business and commercial activities including agriculture, aquaculture, commerce, engineering, forestry, industry, insurance, manufacturing, mining, small business, tourism, trade and transport. As part of its list of strategic initiatives for 2010 the PSC says it will be seeking to fashion closer linkages among the entities comprising the Commission to “develop an integrated voice for advocacy and economic development.”
In recent years, the PSC and other leading private sector organizations have been criticized for failing to serve as an effective lobbying force for the development of the small business sector in Guyana. The announcement of its plans to help provide greater access to financing for small business through efforts to create a Matching Grants Initiative and a Small Business Develop-ment Fund comes in the wake of criticism by entities in the small, medium and micro enterprise sectors of the slow pace in the implementation of the Small Business Act which seeks, among other things, to create a Small Business Bureau designed to support small business development through funding and other forms of technical support including market access. The PSC has also acknowledged its own internal weaknesses by announcing plans to upgrade its web site, increase its human resource and research capabilities and to effect the computerization of its office functions. Additionally, the Commission says that during this year it will be conducting executive training in international marketing, joint venture and international linkages and negotiating skills.
The PSC says that its strategic priority areas in the period ahead will include the development of plans aimed at increasing the competitiveness of Guyanese goods and services within the Caribbean Single Market (CSM), the pursuit of initiatives aimed at ensuring “proper systems of governance and security” designed to encourage investment, the creation of an environment that will facilitate the building of alliances with the regional and international private sectors and with donor agencies and, in partnership with other agencies, “to develop policies and procedures that will reverse the brain drain and provide adequate training to better serve the needs of the country.” Last year, the private sector commenced dialogue with the University of Guyana aimed at establishing a partnership with the University to facilitate the development of programmes designed to assist in the supporting the training of private sector employees and university students in disciplines the support the development of the private sector particularly in technical and scientific fields.
