GuyExpo has set itself apart as the country’s biggest and best example of public/private sector collaboration on commerce and trade promotion and “by far the best forum for the initial marketing of local small enterprises looking to make an entry into the wider market. In those respects and in others it has been a landmark event in trade, commerce and product and service promotion for Guyana,” event Co-Chairman Derrick Cummings told Stabroek Business.
In an extended interview earlier this week Cummings said this year saw the event attract more than 250 local and foreign participants who set up more than 400 booths. That, he said, was an indication of GuyExpo’s “significance for the popularisation of local goods and services.” Cummings also said he believed that by attracting regional businesses to the event and facilitating trade promotion and joint venture initiatives between local and regional firms, GuyExpo was contributing to the realisation of the objectives of the Caricom Single Market.
“Of course the planning and execution of GuyExpo does not always go smoothly. Managing an event of that nature has its challenges. Satisfying the requirements of every exhibitor and ensuring effective execution are major challenges but I think we usually cope well,” Cummings told this newspaper.
Asked about complaints that the private sector has been kept on the periphery of the planning of GuyExpo,
Cummings said the issue had arisen from time to time but as far as he was aware, “what is said never dims the enthusiasm of the private sector for participating in the event… I very often wonder about the validity of the complaint when I see the energy and the enthusiasm with which the private sector participates in GuyExpo.
“It is true that the planning of GuyExpo is largely the responsibility of state entities but in an event of this nature there is bound to be a considerable level of collaboration and I believe that such collaboration takes place at several levels. What should also be considered is that the organisers have managed to create a highly popular event in which the private sector has always maintained a high profile. In fact, GuyExpo is, to an overwhelming extent, a private sector event.”
Asked about the real value of GuyExpo, Cummings said the event means different things to different people. “From a small business perspective it is about providing what is perhaps the biggest short-term trading opportunity for those entities that are prominent in the small business sector.
With thousands of people passing through every day over the weekend of the event there is obviously a market opportunity which is not available every day. What has happened as well is that some of those businesses have been able to use the opportunity to develop a bigger clientele. The bigger firms often appear more interested in the longer-term outcomes that arise out of product promotion by engaging walk through patrons and distributing information and samples. We are aware that there are people who go to GuyExpo looking for particular products and services and almost always some deals are struck there and then,” Cummings said.
With regard to foreign exhibitor participation Cummings said “there is no way that we can ignore the role that an event like GuyExpo plays in creating trading links with the rest of the world. I have heard talk about a profusion of foreign imports and what that says to me is that there is a need to work more aggressively at creating greater demand for locally made products – condiments, garments, craft, processed foods etc then using events like GuyExpo to help get those goods into overseas markets. Our first port of call must be those markets in the region and in the diaspora where there is likely to be a much greater demand for indigenous products.”
Commenting on entertainment as an aspect of GuyExpo Cummings said he did not believe entertainment could either be removed from GuyExpo or reduced to a level where it virtually disappears. “It really is about balance; it is about planning in such a way that the various aspects of the event co-exist with one another in a manner that allows each to serve its own purpose. Once you realise that entertainment, particularly music, has its own market and that that is what helps make the event what it is then, for the sake of the overall success of GuyExpo you have to find a way of accommodating music,” Cummings said, adding that “proper planning is about ensuring pleasing coexistence rather than taking decisions that undermine the very market that you are seeking to create.” And according to Cummings the increasing participation of public sector agencies in GuyExpo is “a significant acknowledgement of the importance of the market that the event has created.” He said that since people are also “in the market for the services provided by the public sector entities, those entities have also found it fit to promote their services at GuyExpo.
“A lot of it has to do with showing the general public how to access and take advantage of important state sector services, and that, in my opinion, is an indication the public sector is also searching for ways of improving the quality of its own service delivery.” ”
