Business Briefs

No going back

Stabroek Business has learnt that such hopes as might have been harboured by vendors who once traded in the shadow of the collapsing and now demolished Bedford Methodist School that they might be returned to their original places have now been dashed by news that – perhaps not surprisingly – the spot has been snapped up by a private investor who is planning on the establishment of a fast food facility there. Church’s Chicken, another of a growing number of such franchises finding their way to Guyana already has a facility set up on the northern half of Bourda Street.

Incidentally, now that the old building has been demolished City Hall is discovering that it had, over time, become a repository for large amounts of remains from the vending in its vicinity.

Vendors chipping in

In the wake of the aggressive cleanup campaign currently underway in Georgetown it would seem that the age-old enmity between urban street vendors and the municipality might well become a thing of the past. City Hall PRO Debra Lewis was mindful to give Regent Street vendors a pat on the back during a recent interview with this newspaper. She said that the municipality was particularly pleased with the fact that the vendors now appear to be wholeheartedly buying-in to the idea of a cleanser capital by ensuring that their trading spaces are kept clean and that they contribute to a general end-of-day cleanup of Regent Street as a whole.

Aviators worry over limited search and

rescue capacity

Head of the local Aircraft Owners Association Michael Correia told an Aviation Seminar in Georgetown earlier this week that apart from the development of a strong Safety and Security Oversight System, the Aviation Industry remains extremely concerned over the very limited and inadequate resources that the country has currently deploy for search and rescue operation.

The need for a powerful twin-engine helicopter capable of rappelling a specialized team that can extract survivors of a crash in the jungle remains a critical necessity.

“Search and rescue coordination between the state agencies and the private sector remains a continuing challenge. As a result, the need for the state to engage our neighbouring countries for support in search and rescue is an immediate priority at this time,” Correia said.