In response to concerns expressed by small vendors who customarily cash in on the annual GuyExpo event, Minister of Business Dominic Gaskin has told the Stabroek Business that the APNU/+FC coalition administration has no intention of removing what has become a highly popular and – for the small and micro business sector – a lucrative one-off market opportunity – from the country’s events’ calendar.
This newspaper had sought and secured official confirmation that GuyExpo, would not be held this year since, according to a senior government spokesman, energies and resources would be directed to the staging of events of that nature in 2016 to mark the 50th anniversary of the country’s attainment of independence.
After Stabroek Business broke the story two weeks ago, small vendors who customarily ply their trade at what they say is their single largest market, expressed concerns about the long-term future of the event, with some wondering aloud as to whether the disclosure that there will be no GuyExpo this year might be a precursor to the event being shelved altogether.
Gaskin, while not commenting on the rumoured nexus between the non-staging of GuyExpo this year and events being planned to mark the country’s landmark independence anniversary, specifically said that the government had no intention of doing away with GuyExpo. He acknowledged that as a forum for the display and marketing of local products and internationalizing what Guyana produces the event had its “value and relevance.” Though he expressed the view that there was a need to streamline GuyExpo to ensure that it better serves its substantive purpose. Specifically, Gaskin said that while he believed that such events could help serve to promote the country’s creative industries there was a need to ensure that the entertainment dimension to GuyExpo did not detract from the substantive purpose of the event.
Meanwhile, Stabroek Business has learnt that the next staging of GuyExpo will take place in May 2016, with inputs from various display and commercial events scheduled to be held across the country over the next few months being included in the May 2016 event.
In a wide-ranging interview with this newspaper on Friday, Minister Gaskin also sought to bring clarity to concerns that have been expressed about the future of the Guyana Office for Investment (Go-Invest). Questions have been raised mostly in the private sector as to whether the state-run agency has been serving its designated purpose of functioning as the key facilitator for local and overseas potential investors. Officials of business support organizations have asserted that the entity has failed to serve as the one-stop facility for investors that it has been touted to be.
Apart from the official decision to retain and presumably strengthen Go-Invest, the new political administration has shifted responsibility for the entity from what was once the Office of the President to the Ministry of Business. Gaskin told Stabroek Business that he saw no need to tamper with the mandate of the entity which is, to “facilitate investment” though there was clearly a need to strengthen its capacity to effectively execute its mandate.
While the immediate concern was that Go-Invest had been without a board since the end of last year, a new board chaired by the minister and including representatives of the political opposition and the private sector is now in place. Gaskin said the new board met a week ago for the first time, minus the representative of the political opposition, to deal with issues that include the challenges facing Go-Invest and to provide recommendations regarding the way forward.
