The Guyana International Petroleum Exhibition (GIPEX) yesterday ended with high praise from the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) which lauded the move to make booth space rentals more affordable to locals this year.
But given that a lot of the local companies are startups, the GCCI believes that additional ways have to be looked at to see if the costs could be brought down even further to meet the pockets of locals.
“Yes [we are]. We motivated a number of local [participants],” Head of the GCCI, Nicholas Boyer responded yesterday when asked if the Chamber was pleased about the local participation.
GIPEX was organised by Valiant Business Media of the UK, in partnership with the Government of Guyana through the Department of Energy, Ministry of the Presidency and with support from the Guyana Office for Investment.
Questions have been raised as to why Valiant has to be involved in the organising and why this couldn’t be done by a local agency via tender.
Representatives from all of the partners yesterday afternoon held a press conference at the end of the three-day event and all hailed it as successful.
Valiant Business Media said that it held discussions with government and private sector officials to make the booths more affordable because even the already discounted rates seemed too high for many local companies.
The Managing Director of the company, Shariq AbdulHai, said that as the company prepares for next year, it will continue to seek out ways of having more locals participate in the exhibition.
He said that this year the company had some late registrants and this was why many of the locals were given booths in the pavilions at the back.
“Lot of things depended on when they confirmed. We would help to put them in where the space is available. People would think why does Exxon have the biggest booth? But it is because they put in the substantial [amount],” he said, while promising that the feedback from the public will not fall on deaf ears.
Head of the Department of Energy Dr Mark Bynoe said that he engaged with the private sector and his agency will also be assessing ways of making the conference more beneficial to locals.
“They did engage with us and [Boyer] can tell you about the arrangement put in place to make it more accessible,” Bynoe said.
The DoE also had a number of interactions with regional and international companies, who Bynoe explained were seeking to have a better understanding of what are government’s plans for up-, mid- and downstream businesses here and how they could assist in all areas of the value chain.
Valiant wanted to underscore that the conference did not cost the people of Guyana anything financially. AbdulHai said that overall about US$500,000 was invested in the organising and hosting but he would have to wait until after his accounts are audited to know how much of a profit was made.
“If you compare it to last year, it has definitely gone bigger and better…but we are always careful of the fact that we don’t get carried away,” he said.
GIPEX organisers had last month put out a statement dismissing reports that taxpayers’ money was being used to partially fund the exhibition.
“GIPEX is 100% funded by Valiant Business Media by way of support and sponsorship from companies in the oil and gas industry, as is standard with the staging of such events,” the organisation said, adding “No revenue from taxpayers is used for the staging of this event.”
It had also pointed out that rates are subsidised for 100% Guyanese companies which allows for exhibitors to receive a 35% discount. That amount was reduced even further but it is unclear what the final costs were.
The event’s organisers say that it enables the opportunity for Guyanese companies to announce new joint ventures and partnerships to the media, by way of scheduled press briefings which aid in maximising their visibility and this year it had eight of those.
