Stabroek Business has learnt that a planned public/private sector National Economic Forum disclosed to this newspaper in June last year by Chairman of the Private Sector Commission (PSC) Major General (retd) Norman McLean in June last year and originally scheduled for last September remains “a work in progress” and will go ahead after all though a new date is yet to be decided upon for the forum.
This newspaper had raised the matter of the absence of an explanation from either government or the private sector after the original September time frame for the forum had passed. An anticipated new “later date” passed without any word from the stakeholders. Following an editorial in the Stabroek Business raising the issue of the official silence on the matter of the forum an official source had advised this newspaper that there was some degree of uncertainty as to whether the state of relations between government and the private sector allowed for the staging of a National Economic Forum at that time.
Late last week, however, this newspaper received a letter from McLean in which the private sector Head said that the forum was yet to be staged “despite our best efforts” adding that while the forum “will happen…the format and timing are still to be finalized.”
In June last year McLean had told Stabroek Business that the PSC had been tasked with preparing the groundwork for the National Economic Forum which he had said would involve stakeholders in the diaspora.
In his January 6 letter McLean said that work had already been done in structuring the forum and establishing nine economic clusters, each led by a coordinator and a team. Those “clusters” listed in McLean’s communication are Energy and Electricity, Agri-culture and Fisheries, Mining-Quarrying, Forestry, Manufacturing and Services, ICT, To-urism, Transportation and Rupununi Development. In his letter McLean restates the involvement of members of the diaspora in the forum adding that the Office of the President and Professor C.Y. Thomas will be involved in the exercise.
Since the announcement of the planned economic forum last year there has been no official pronouncement from either the Office of the President or the Ministry of Business on the matter though sources in the Ministry of Business have confirmed that the plans for a National Economic Forum derived directly from a meeting between President David Granger and a delegation from the Private Sector Commission.
