Business

With Guyana now expected to significantly enhance its health care portfolio to keep pace with the country’s envisaged broader development trajectory, the local Optical Care Service, Optique Vision, has disclosed that it is investing in the establishment of a new Optical Care Hospital at its existing 350 New Market street location.

It would appear that Guyana is by no means the only the only Caribbean Community (CARICOM) member country where persons employed in the private sector have the shock of their lives at particularly vulnerable moments upon discovering that huge chunks of National Insurance Scheme (NIS) deductions have ‘gone south’ insofar as amounts deducted from their salaries as contributions towards their pension schemes, are not paid in by their employers but have, instead, ended up, presumably, in the pockets of delinquent business owners who failed to properly route those deductions.

Caribbean be warned! If the already searing heat that has already descended on the region is not only creating a generous measure of discomfort for the citizenry but may also be casting doubt on the extent to which our food production pursuits will measure up to the 25×2025 target, the regional climate monitoring body, Caribbean Climate Body (CariCOF) is predicting what is is being described as “increased heat stress” in the region for at least the duration of October.

In a region where airline travel has been continually bursting at the seams, the Trinidad and Tobago state-owned airline, Caribbean Airlines is looking to raise its game by leasing a dozen new passenger aircraft to deal with increasing intra-regional passenger demand.

(Trinidad Guardian) While Venezuela will receive the equivalent of millions of US dollars monthly from the gas agreement to exploit the Dragon Gas Field reserves, Director of the Latin American Energy Program at the Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy Dr Francisco Monaldi is not sure that if Venezuela will receive the value in cash or non-cash payments.

Pointing unerringly to her intention to chart a foreign policy course that she regards as best for her tiny island nation, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley has, in recent weeks, sent unmistakable signals that she is determined to hitch her country’s sails, first, to the mast of its self- interest. 

Caribbean countries are in a desperate need of an energy transition, the think-thank Atlantic Council has stated.

BOGOTA,  (Reuters) – French energy company EDF Renewables yesterday said it will withdraw from a solar energy project in central Colombia due to delays in permits, as well as regulatory and tax changes.

Oct 2 (Reuters) – Venezuela’s oil exports in September topped 800,000 barrels per day (bpd), the second highest monthly average this year, as state-run oil firm PDVSA and its joint ventures recovered output, particularly in the Orinoco Belt. 

Kitco Market Data Gold Prices for the three day period ending Thursday October 5, 2023

Guyana’s agro processing sector is favourably positioned to step up way above where it is at this time.

A University of the West Indies lecturer with whom the Stabroek Business spoke with last week whilst viewing an indigenous culinary and craft display on Main Street Avenue made the point that up until now Guyana had failed, “and signally so,” to properly embrace what he described as “valuable” indigenous skills and creativity to bear within the country’s entrepreneurial mainstream.

It is becoming increasingly apparent that skilled indigenous craftsmen and women are seeking to extend their ambitions beyond simply parading their talents to provide coastal admirers with access to their work through seasonal bazaars at absurdly ‘knocked down’ prices. 

About a week ago, sections of the regional media delivered news that the Assistant Director General and Regional Representative for Latin America and the Caribbean for the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), had addressed the opening function of the “High-Level Agricultural Ministerial Meeting” held in Kingston, Jamaica on September 18.

Engaging craftsmen and women above the din of the music blaring from speakers mounted on a giant truck on Main Street last Saturday evening felt, at times, like ‘sheer torture.’

Preparations are in full swing for 17th staging of the Caribbean Week of Agriculture (CWA), the Caribbean Region’s premier agricultural event, in The Bahamas, 9 -13 October 2023.

Washington, having been instrumental in deploying mostly sanctions to degrade Venezuela’s oil and gas industry, the administration of United States’ President Joe Biden appears to be mindful that it does not preside over the complete collapse of the energy sector of the country believed to possess the asingle largest volume of oil reserves anywhere in the world.

The earliest public disclosure on Guyana’s first confirmed oil ‘strike’ by ExxonMobil back in 2015, was, without question, one of the most significant pieces of public information to be disseminated to Guyanese in the country’s history.