Readying ourselves for the challenge of doing business with Brazil

Setting aside the hoped-for significant outcomes of the exchanges between and among businessmen and women on the two sides, by far the most significant thing about the visit was the fact that the Brazilian delegation choose to travel by road rather than by air, a gesture that puts into perspective the significance which the Brazilians attach to a road link between the two countries.

Brazilian Ambassador to Guyana Gilberto Seixes de Anrade should be taken seriously when he says that Brazil is serious about improving economic relations and enhancing trade with Guyana and no one can be blamed for wondering whether Guyana is in fact up to the challenge. Cementing closer business ties with Brazil is, in the main, a private sector responsibility but we cannot overlook the responsibility of government for creating an enabling environment to allow for the strengthening of those relations and we know only too well that government in Guyana has, over the years, been notorious, firstly, for the crab-like pace at which it works and, secondly, for its proclivity for putting bureaucratic hindrances in the way of strengthening trade and investment ties. The tomes of bilateral agreements with Brazil and Venezuela, particularly, that have to do with trade and commercial enhancement and which have never been implemented would probably require an archive of their own.

Of course, no one wants to pour cold water on what may well turn out to be a signal moment in Guyana/Brazil relations, the point simply has to be made that the visit has to be treated as the beginning of a continuous process and that as far as strengthening business ties with Brazil is concerned – an eventuality which is really long overdue – the momentum simply has to be sustained.

In making the point that the Lethem Road and the creation of a modern and reliable electricity generation network are integral parts of the broader initiative to accelerate ties economic ties between Brazil and Guyana, the Brazilian Ambassador was in fact saying – none too subtly – that the Takutu Bridge is only one aspect of the network of infrastructure necessary to bring the two sides together. Creating the full range of infrastructure on the Guyana side to cope with the challenge of a significantly scaled up level of trade and traffic between Guyana and Brazil is not a challenge that can be taken lightly though it has to be said that some work has already been done by both the government and the private sector to put the necessary structure in place.

Another challenge that is already apparent is the language barrier between Guyana and Brazil, the implications of which were clear when the two delegations sought to communicate at the level of the sectoral exchanges during this week’s forum. Here, both government and the private sector are presented with both challenges and opportunities in terms of creating language learning institutions. Therefore, the recent announcement by the University of the West Indies’ Arthur Loc Jack Graduate School of Business that the teaching of Portuguese would be part of its Executive MBA programme is particularly timely.

The argument that prospects for Guyana’s economic development in the short to medium term will depend significantly on the extent to which we can succeed in cementing trade, commercial and business cooperation ties with Brazil is an entirely valid one particularly when one takes account of the fact that there is probably no aspect of Guyana’s infrastructure development – be it agriculture, information technology, manufacturing, eco-tourism, oil exploration, aquaculture, business-related research or any other field – in which Brazil cannot be of assistance. We can therefore be forgiven if we seem to be belabouring the point that the opportunity afforded by the prospects of building bridges with Brazil is one which we simply cannot afford to ignore.