An air of expectancy has been created in Rosignol and neighbouring communities as the first major shopping mall on the West Coast Berbice enters the final stages of construction. So keen are vendors to begin trading in an enhanced environment that even in its incomplete state all 18 of the units in the $50 million facility have already been taken.
The investors in the project are Angad and Jaggernauth Ganesh, two brothers who were born in Rosignol. Angad, the younger of the two, has returned to Guyana after residing in Canada for five years. He is charged with managing their investments. Jaggernauth, the older brother, has been residing in Canada for the past 16 years where he owns and operates an auto refurbishing business.
As shopping malls go the Agape (Greek for love) Shopping Mall is a modest complex. The trading units measure 14ft x 25ft. Each is fitted with an independent lighting facility. Adapting the spaces to meet individual trading requirements is the responsibility of the vendors. Still, the sizeable two-storey building dwarfs the other buildings in the community. It sits on the corners of the West Coast Berbice Public Road and Burnham Avenue, an ideal location from which to trade.
The emergence of the Agape Shopping Mall reflects the changing fortunes of the communities on the Rosignol and New Amsterdam sides of the Berbice river. The advent of the Berbice River Bridge has diminished trading among small operators on both sides of the river. Whereas the decline in trade in the absence of a regular ferry service has affected other businesses in New Amsterdam, Rosignol appears to be entering a period of commercial expansion and the emergence of the mall leads one to believe that appearances, in this instance, are not deceiving.
This week, workers were busying themselves putting the finishing touches to the mall. Shelves and shutters were being installed and Angad was overseeing the exercise with a proprietaraly air. Beside the mall sits a car park that can probably accommodate about 20 cars.
The formal opening of the mall will take place some time in August. By that time, Angad says, the vendors will be installed and trading would have commenced. He wants the vendors and the community as a whole to be part of what he sees both as an investment and as a gift to the community. The vast majority of the vendors who will occupy the units in the mall are from Rosignol and neighbouring communities. One is a businessman from Georgetown, another from Canje on the East Bank Berbice, and an investor from the United Kingdom has rented four of the units.
Angad is upbeat about business but prefers to talk about that role which the shopping mall will play in the lives of people in the community. A facility of this type represents a place where various types of goods and services can be offered. This he considers to be a convenience to Rosignol and neighbouring communities. That apart, he makes a point of stating that the vendors will employ around 40 persons. Angad also appears versed in the commonplace marketing gambit of ‘giving back,’ and he says he intends to do so through various gestures that target schools, children and the needy. His outlook appears to be shaped by his own upbringing. He was born into a family that ran a modest liquor store and his good fortune and that of his brother affords him the opportunity to help build what, traditionally, has a community that has relied on fishing and on employment provided by the Blairmont Sugar Estate.
When trading gets into full swing the Agape Shopping Mall will offer a supermarket and grocery, boutique, a jewellery store, an ice cream parlour, an information technology support facility, a beauty salon, a gift shop and clothing stores among others.
Angad says that the near completion of the mall appears to have triggered an accelerated demand among vendors in Rosignol and elsewhere. He has already begun to contemplate the construction of a second similar facility in the community.
