Business

A sharper focus on value-added production and discussions with stakeholders on the formulation of a new log export policy are amongst the priorities for the forestry sector identified in the five-year (2015-2020) – strategic plan promulgated by the Forest Products Development and Marketing Council of Guyana (FPDMC).

It will take some time for the full impact of the closure of its Caribbean operations by the American cosmetics giant Avon to be felt in the Guyana economy, but amongst the vendors, mostly women, who have, for years, sold the company’s cosmetics goods from their living rooms, in small makeshift stores and even from pavements, the end of Avon’s operations in Guyana appears to have brought with it a sense of shock and bewilderment.

By Dale Beresford It comes as no surprise to me that in the wake of three serious workplace accidents in coastal Guyana in about three weeks neither the Ministry of Labour, the private sector nor the trade union movement have issued a substantive statement on these accidents.

Given its focus on targeting poor families in coastal and rural communities seeking to secure sustainable livelihoods, the Partners of the Americas shade house farming initiative has attracted considerable attention across the country.

GASCI (www.gasci.com/telephone Nº 223-6175/6) reports that session 603’s trading results showed consideration of $4,327,173 from 58,745 shares traded in 27 transactions as compared to session 602’s trading results, which showed consideration of $4,552,359 from 147,915 shares traded in 21 transactions.

There were some revealing stories to be told this week by persons, mostly women, involved in the marketing of Avon products here in Guyana following the announcement by the American company that it was closing its distribution operations in sixteen Caribbean countries, including Guyana.

Gold Prices for the three day period ending Thursday February 19, 2015

Business Cartoons

Few of the hundreds of local small producers in the food, drink and condiments subsectors turned up at last month’s seminar on packaging and labelling, though they needed to be there if they were to become aware of just how far away they are from realizing their dreams of lucrative overseas markets.

Roraima Airways CEO delivering a lecture at a careers guidance session at the School of Nations earlier this week.

Safety and Health Consultant Dale Beresford has told Stabroek Business that if reports regarding possible links between a defective storage tank at the Caricom Rice Mills Ltd (CRML) and last Friday’s death of company employee 17-year-old Threeion Gittens are sustainable then critical questions arise about “the diligence or otherwise” of both CRML and the Ministry of Labour as far as their safety and health obligations are concerned.

Up to the time of the writing of this editorial neither the public nor the private sector had bothered to make a public comment on the fact that there were two workplace accidents on the two preceding Fridays; the first in the bauxite industry and the second in the rice sector.

General Secretary of the Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC) Lincoln Lewis has told the Stabroek Business that the impression which Natural Resources and the Environment Minister Robert Persaud appears to have gleaned from the management of the Bauxite Company Guyana Inc.

Bartica may have come to be known as the gateway to Guyana’s gold-rich interior but these days, like the prevailing gold price, its fortunes are declining and no one is prepared to take a serious bet on where the decline would end.

Local state-run, technology-driven entities were earlier this month afforded the rare opportunity of interfacing with the internationally renowned Chinese-owned Lenovo, currently among the world’s leading personal computer manufacturers and IT innovators.

The USAID-funded Skills and Knowledge for Youth Employment (SKYE) project which seeks to develop entrepreneurial and management skills among young Guyanese through its “Be Your Own Boss” (BYOB) initiative will, on Wednesday February 18, show off the achievements of the first batch of young people who have successfully completed the programme.

Kitco is a Canadian company that buys and sells precious metals such as gold, copper and silver.

GASCI (www.gasci.com/telephone Nº 223-6175/6) reports that session 602’s trading results showed consideration of $4,552,359 from 147,915 shares traded in 21 transactions as compared to session 601’s trading results, which showed consideration of $49,088,362 from 905,442 shares traded in 51 transactions.

At a time when young Guyanese seeking to gain entry into the world of business complain with monotonous regularity about closed doors, Canadian University Services Overseas (CUSO) Youth Entrepreneurship Advisor Pamela Grant hopes her five-month stay in Guyana will result in a breakdown of the “silos” that stand between young people and the business sector.