No requiem for bauxite yet

Natural Resources Minister Raphael Trotman

That the foreboding clouds of declining global demand and receding world market prices are not sufficient to persuade the Government of Guyana to give up on the future of bauxite as a major money-earner for the country’s economy was the underlying theme of last Wednesday’s address at a centennial symposium for the bauxite industry.

At a forum which might well have been regarded in some quarters as a channel for nostalgic reflections on a passing era and a requiem for a commodity that played a major role in the creation and consolidation of one of the country’s most socially and politically significant communities, Trotman announced, seemingly to the surprise of many that government is setting up an expert Bauxite Sectoral Review Committee.