Local business entities in the information technology, food and beverage and engineering sectors will this evening be recognized for their respective contributions to innovation and enterprise in the creation and delivery of goods and services when the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA) hosts its sixteenth Dinner and Awards Ceremony in the ballroom of the Princess Hotel at Providence.
Stabroek Business has been informed that the likely awardees at this evening’s event include the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GT&T), Banks DIH Ltd, EC Vieira Investments Ltd, and Sterling Products. Other nominees for awardees in the various categories include the local Call Centre Qualfon, the apiculture entity Kingdom Apiary Products and Supplies and the wood products specialists Bulkan Timber Works.
This evening’s Dinner and Awards Ceremony comes at the close of a resurgent year for the GMSA which has been engaged in promoting the interests of the local manufacturing and services sectors locally, regionally and internationally. The association’s regional assignments in 2011 include coordinating Guyana’s participation in a regional forum held in Trinidad and Tobago to coordinate Caricom’s contribution to the rebuilding programme in Haiti. On the international front, the association also played a pivotal role in ensuring Guyana’s representation in the Third China/Caribbean Economic and Trade Cooperation forum held in Port of Spain in September this year. The latter assignment has significantly raised the profile of the GMSA given its important lobbying role in seeking markets for locally manufactured products in China and encouraging bilateral business ties between local and Chinese firms. In September, a delegation from the GMSA attended Design Caribbean, the region’s largest trade show.
This year, the GMSA, in collaboration with Go-Invest was also instrumental in cementing ties with the influential Brazilian small business support organisation SEBRAE under which the Brazilian agency is to undertake a number of market intelligence studies in Guyana and in the Brazilian states of Roraima and Amazonia aimed at enabling enhanced business and investment cooperation in the aquaculture, maritime, agriculture craft production and tourism sectors.
This year the GMSA has also been cited for its work in collaboration with the Guyana National Bureau of Standards in enhancing awareness among local manufacturers and service providers of the need for adherence to national manufacturing standards. In this regard the GMSA was instrumental in securing funding to the tune of US$3.25 million to finance work aimed at the implementation of the Caribbean Regional Human Resource Development Programme for Economic competitiveness (CPEC) project which is designed to prepare regional businesses for accreditation and certification.
In April, the GMSA successfully hosted a series of three discourses between the presidential candidates competing at the November 28 general and regional elections, setting a precedent aimed at enabling the local business community to secure insights into their intended initiatives to further strengthen the Guyana economy. GMSA President Clinton Williams said then that the exercises were intended to strengthen the role of the business sector as social partners in the development of Guyana which, according to him, would enable the creation of workable strategies for furthering the development of the country’s social and economic landscape.
Over the years the GMSA’s Dinner and Awards event have cited local manufacturing and service entities for, among other things, successful pioneering work in their respective fields of endeavor, enhancement of existing product lines and diversification into new products, successfully penetrating regional and international markets and fostering wholesome workplace practices and equal employment opportunity regimes.
This evening’s awards ceremony will also witness the presentation of a special award to a local entity in the name of President Bharrat Jagdeo for export achievement and the presentation of an individual Lifetime Award for supporting the work of the GMSA.
