An opportunity to shine

In a recent interview with this newspaper, President of the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA) Clinton Williams expressed the view that some of the sub-sectors in the local private sector were not being sufficiently aggressive in seeking markets for their goods and services beyond the shores of Guyana. Mr Williams was speaking specifically in the context of the construction sector, which, he appeared to believe, has demonstrated a level of indifference to the opportunities that exist for participating in projects associated with the major rebuilding programme currently underway in earthquake-ravaged Haiti.

The GMSA has been proactive in monitoring those opportunities. Mr Williams has visited Haiti. It was after his return from a recent visit that he expressed disappointment over the fact that opportunities to visit Haiti to assess the situation there and the prospects for securing contracts had been turned down by some local firms once they discovered that they would have to pay their own air fares.

Some local firms may argue, of course, that the building boom in both the housing and commercial sectors in Guyana offers a sufficiently substantial domestic market to obviate the need to look elsewhere, at least in the short term. The argument has also been made that international firms in the construction and other sectors possessing a far greater level of technical competence and experience in projects of the magnitude of the Haiti rebuilding programme have had a head start in the Haiti situation. Therefore, the smaller, less experienced and less technically proficient Guyanese firms stand little chance of coming out ahead in competitive tender processes.

The second argument has now been challenged by two welcome developments. First, Caricom governments appear determined that regional firms with the requisite competencies, including Haitian firms, must play a part in the rebuilding exercise in Haiti. Second, we learnt just days ago, that the region has been successful in assembling a US$1 billion fund for the purpose of helping to finance the involvement of regional firms in the Haitian rebuilding programme.

The plan, it seems, is to create alliances between and among Haitian firms and firms from other Caribbean territories by helping to fund capacity-building, thereby creating a more level playing field vis-à-vis firms from outside the region. In fact, while it has not been said as yet, one hopes that arrangements for some amount of exclusive tendering will be put in place for projects which are determined to be within the competency of Caribbean firms.

The information that has been given to Stabroek Business has underscored the roles played by the Caribbean Community Secretariat, former Jamaican Prime Minister PJ Patterson and the Caribbean Association of Industry and Commerce (CAIC) in the various facets of the initiative associated with the mobilization of the fund. Additionally, we are mindful of the role of the GMSA and its President in monitoring the unfolding initiative and ‘looking out’ for the interests of the local private sector. In sum, the efforts of the respective parties are to be applauded and, from a Guyana standpoint, the work done by the Mr Williams and the GMSA is deserving of full recognition.

What we must await, however, is the response by the various sub-sectors in the Guyana private sector to the opportunities which have now been opened up as a result of the creation of the US$1 billion fund. Guyana’s reputation in the construction field is well-known throughout the region and the opportunity to make a meaningful and lasting contribution to Haiti’s rebuilding process while, simultaneously, taking advantage of expanded markets for that particular sector is not one that should be missed. Another plus, of course, is the opportunity afforded by what is in fact a Caribbean-wide initiative, to develop a better understanding of the territory-by-territory competencies in the various skill areas that are being deployed in Haiti and the prospects of creating collaborative alliances among Caribbean firms out of which can emerge joint ventures that will provide the highest quality of work on future major regional projects, including other emergency rebuilding and reconstruction eventualities that might well materialize in the Caribbean in the future. Further, the best practices that will result from such ventures can then be adopted by the various sectors across the region.  

The realization of the fund, apart from being an outstanding regional initiative deserving of the highest praise, provides an opportunity for the regional private sector to work together and, perhaps more importantly, to demonstrate that the skills available in the various sectors in the region can match those in the same sectors in the developed world. It is an opportunity that goes beyond the Haiti rebuilding exercise. It is an opportunity to showcase the capacity of the region to the rest of the world and perhaps, create new markets for some of the skills of the Caribbean beyond the region itself.  The Guyana private sector, particularly the construction sector, cannot afford to turn its back on such an opportunity.