US saw milling company Simon and Shock Incor-porated (SSI) hopes to get its US$26 million investment in Guyana started next month.
It is in the process of working out some aspects of its agreement in the light of changes owing to problems in the industry with land-lording of small concessionaires.
Speaking to this newspaper on Tuesday, CEO Kelly Simon said that with the new measures in place to prevent land-lording by companies on other concessions, the newly tailored arrangements for the use of equipment in these concessions were in their end stages.
He said that the company proposes to lease its equipment to the concession holders and train them in the safe and proper use of the equipment, which he described as brand new.
According to Simon, someone on the government side asked whether the company was willing to give the equipment to the concessionaires, to which he said no way, since his investors wouldn’t allow US$4 million in equipment to be handed over just like that.
After months of due diligence and some tension between the company and the Guyana Office for Invest-ment (Go-Invest) last year, government through the Guyana Forestry Commis-sion (GFC) granted a State Forest Exploratory Permit to SSI about two and a half months ago.
The company has been awarded concessions totalling 391,892 hectares in Regions Six and Nine and expects total employment to exceed 112 with at least 85 per cent local hire, ranging from senior management to starting positions.
The company plans to invest over US$26 million in three years.
The technology that the company hopes to introduce to Guyana is said to have impressed government, which has been chirruping its desire lately to bring sustainable forestry, high recovery rates, and value adding investment to the industry. This followed President Bharrat Jagdeo’s offer of Guyana’s forests to the world to combat the effects of climate change.
The company is also working out with the government, the exact location for the sawmilling plant to be constructed at Linden.
While on the phone with this reporter, Simon was also speaking to the company’s lawyers on the paperwork to be drawn up for the commencement of the investment. He said that another company executive would be in Guyana during next week to further the arrangements with the government.
Simon said SSI hoped to achieve recovery rates upwards of 70 per cent, twice as much as is being achieved in Guyana today.
The company is building from the ground up, a brand new, modern sawmill, which, with the aid of computer imagery, will be able to scan a log and calculate the number of boards that it would yield.
In this way, the little waste it produces would be used to power its kiln-drying plant. The company would be buying about half of its logs from other concessions.
As a direct result of the talks with the government, the company offered three written guarantees. Firstly, that SSI would not export logs from Guyana, since it was a lumber company and not a logging company; secondly, that SSI would build an advanced milling complex in Linden before any logging activity took place; and thirdly, that if SSI did not build the advanced mill in Linden in a specific time period, all logging concessions granted to SSI by the government would be returned uncut.
