In a development that underscores the fact that Guyana is currently strategically positioned in the ‘pecking order’ of potential investment havens in the region, the Caribbean Export Development Agency (CARIBEXPORT) disclosed recently that the 2024 Caribbean Investment Forum, the region’s single largest investment promotion platform will be held here. The announcement is consistent with a recent trend of Guyana staging high-profile meetings of regional and international potential investors drawn to the country on account of its condition as an emerging petro-state. Major international conferences that see high-flying potential investors from Europe and North America rubbing shoulders with more modest delegations from the region have now become a familiar occurrence in a country which, not ‘many moons’ ago, had been limited to attracting modest business fora to which the media, outside of Guyana, paid only limited attention.
Where interest in Guyana’s investment potential is concerned oil has worked wonders. Oil, some commentators say, can work wonders. What it has done for Guyana, up to this time, is to cause more outsiders to make a serious effort to locate the South American country on a map and in many instances to make first-time visits here. The practice has grown to a point where, these days, Guyana matches most of the other member countries of CARICOM in attracting ‘business visitors’ and there are no signs that the inflow will slow any time soon. Up until the last handful of years, Guyana, with its sub-standard physical infrastructure may well not even have ‘made’ the short list of Caribbean countries singled out as likely venues for a Caribbean investment forum. Issues pertaining to inadequate numbers of hotel rooms, a scarcity of conference facilities, the physical state of the capital and sloth and inefficiency in delivery of services in both the public and private sectors were bound to have arisen as impediments to major events being held here.
If none of those constraining factors have changed, what has changed completely is the transformation of Guyana’s bona fides as an investment haven that now makes the difference. If all of the amenities required to make the country altogether convivial for hosting high-profile regional and international conferences are still by no means in place, there has at least been evidence of effort made to effect a measure of change. Georgetown is currently in the throes of a transformation. Not only has the city’s best-known international hotels undergone some measure of upgrading, but restaurants and shopping have moved to raise their game. While the intervening disruption is often an irritant, at least, these days, there exists a general sense that something of a makeover is on the cards for the country’s capital. Not that all is moving smoothly. Transformation is attended by levels of disruption and confusion that are sometimes difficult to bear and amidst the ‘confusion’ associated with transformation, some of the country’s critical services, notably law enforcement, are not always perceived as pulling their weight. Unquestionably, the process of transformation will be attended by considerable dislocation.
With the disclosure that next year’s regional investment forum will be staged here will come a further international groundswell of interest in Guyana by regional and international business interests seeking investment openings in a country which, after a protracted experience of poverty, is only just beginning to build a pleasing image. To get there, the country is going to have to not just undertake hefty investment in significantly upgraded physical infrastructure but also to raise service standards in areas of the public sector of which more will be demanded, going forward. Those enhanced services will have to include a more efficient Public Service, not least the law-enforcement dimension. There will also have to be significant investments in the upgrading of critical infrastructure, notably electricity, paved roads and convivial spaces and facilities for recreation. If what obtains at this time suggests that we are off to a jerky start, at least there is evidence of a modicum of momentum.
