Chinese firm, Haier Electrical Appliances Ltd will set up an assembly plant here and plans to establish an industrial park in an investment pegged at US$10 million.
“Right now we are looking at the assembly for the laptops and the computers because we’ve already gotten the assembly line conveyor belt, trolleys, technology stuff and so on. That’s here now,” businessman Brian James, who is the firm’s local partner, told Stabroek News at the commissioning of Haier’s warranty service centre at Middle Street yesterday.
Last year, Haier won a US$7.56 million contract for the supply of 27,000 netbooks for the government’s One Laptop Per Family (OLPF) project. Under the project, the government hopes to distribute 90,000 computers to poor families over two years. Among the terms of the contract, is an 18 months warranty period and the company has set up the location for this purpose as well as the sale of Haier products. The location was officially opened by Prime Minister Samuel Hinds yesterday. James said that so far, 11,000 computers have been distributed and of this number, about 220 were returned for service under the warranty though, according to him, some of the issues raised were “fairly ludicrous.”
Head of the Middle Street office Nyall Jodhan said that four staff have been employed at the location and two more are needed.
James said Haier hopes to take advantage of Guyana’s bilateral agreements with places like Brazil and the Union of South American states to sell the computers manufactured here to those countries. The businessman disclosed that currently, they are also looking for suitable land to set up the plant and hope to set it up in about 18 months.
In addition, he said, they plan to establish a technology park here within five years. “We are working right now on formulating the plan,” he said. In relation to the technology park, James told Stabroek News, “we’re looking at about US$10 million and hopefully direct employment will be about 500 but there will be a lot of spin-offs.” He said the project will be done in phases and added that total employment potential could be 1,000.
China’s ambassador to Guyana Yu Wenzhe said Haier is one of the top Chinese brands and he is happy at the extension of cooperation through the transfer of technology and in the not too distant future, he hopes to see Haier branded products in Guyana. He said that the project is an example of the cooperation between Guyana and China.
In his remarks, Prime Minister Hinds said that Haier has landed in a big way in Guyana. “I am pleased to hear and to see some evidence of the plans to quite soon establish some assembly point here in Guyana,” he said. He said that government has faith that Haier would deliver. “The fate of the One Laptop Per Family programme is to some extent in your hands and we have good reason to have faith in you,” he said.
He stated that government is determined that no Guyanese should be computer illiterate because of lack of access to a computer.
