Fibre Tech proprietor calls for GMA-organized export promotion fair
Controversy over the allocation of booth space at the recently concluded GuyExpo 2009 may have resulted in non-participation in the event by at least one major local manufacturer, according to a source close to the event.
This newspaper has been reliably informed that the Mon Repos-based home furnishing manufacturer Fibre Tech Industries withdrew from GuyExpo after the twelve booth spaces for which it had applied were denied and an amount of six offered instead. Stabroek Business was informed that the space allocation applied for by Fibre Tech this year was identical to that which it had occupied in previous years. Following the withdrawal of Fibre Tech, another local manufacturer was allocated the booth space.
Contacted for a comment on the company’s non-participation in this year’s GuyExpo Managing Director Somat Ali would only confirm that he had made an application for twelve booth spaces at the event. However, this newspaper understands that the booth space allocation requested by Fibre Tech was twice reduced and that the company’s withdrawal from the event came after its owner had insisted that he be allocated the space for which he had originally applied. A GuyExpo source who declined to be identified confirmed that the number of booths originally applied for by Fibre Tech had been reduced by half and that the decision not to take up the space eventually allocated was made by the company after a meeting between Ali and Commerce Minister Manniram Prashad failed to settle the matter to Fibre Tech’s satisfaction. The source told Stabroek Business that the investigation into the space allocation issue and the eventual outcome may have been mishandled and that under the circumstances Fibre Tech was “probably justified” in withdrawing from the event. “The truth is that some things did go wrong during the planning of the event. Apart from the late start there were other logistical problems, the types of which would usually arise during the planning of big events.”
Other prominent local manufacturers including A.H.& L Kissoon, Precision Woodworking and Shiva Woodworking were absent from this year’s GuyExpo. When contacted A.H&L Kissoon Managing Director Hemraj Kissoon told Stabroek Business that the company was “not prepared” for the event this year while the Shiva Woodworking official said that his company had “no comment” to make on its non-participation in this year’s GuyExpo.
Chairman of the Private Sector Commission and Chief Executive Officer of the Roraima Group of Companies Captain Gerry Gouveia also confirmed that his company played no part in GuyExpo this year.
While the GuyExpo source conceded that this year’s event faced space allocation and other logistical problems” Stabroek Business has also learnt that that the absence of some of the country’s more prominent manufacturers from the event may have been a function of the prevailing economic crisis. However, some entities that participated in the event, notably businesses in the craft sector expressed disappointment over what they felt was a predominance of small traders marketing cheaper, craft imported mostly from China. There were some of the customary concerns over whether or not the GuyExpo ‘environment’, with what one exhibitor described as its “big lime” backdrop, was conducive to the creation of the kind of environment which its organizers say the event seeks to create.
When Stabroek Business visited the exhibition site early on Saturday evening most of the hundreds of visitors to GuyExpo were showing an interest in the booths set up by the cellular service providers while scores of others were entertaining themselves at the bars set up by the various businesses in the food and beverage services sectors. By mid-evening the ticket booths outside of exhibition site were under siege from hundreds of mostly young persons who were obviously seeking a night out at GuyExpo.
Stabroek Business was told by its GuyExpo source that this year the number of potential buyers from overseas were “far fewer” than expected. Prior to the start of the event this newspaper was told that potential buyers of local craft from Brazil and Venezuela were expected to be in Guyana for the event. However, the GuyExpo source told Stabroek Business that while there was “modest Caribbean representation” at GuyExpo, “no formal delegations” from either of the two neighbouring countries showed up.
Craft producers with whom Stabroek Business spoke expressed disappointment over the commercial outcome of the event, pointing out that visitors to GuyExpo appeared to show a great deal of interest in the imports being sold by traders who participated in GuyExpo. Asked to comment on the craft producers’ concerns, the GuyExpo source said that the $35,000 per booth which the craft producers were required to pay was “probably too high” and, “perhaps, did not really allow them to make any particular money.”
Meanwhile, the Fibre Tech Managing Director told Stabroek Business that he believed that the private sector, “and specifically the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA) ought to plan its own trade and export forum for local manufacturers that would allow for local producers of goods and services to interface with both local and overseas buyers. Ali said that such a forum “without some of the distractions that apply at GuyExpo” could benefit the manufacturing sector significantly.
