Business

Jo-Ann Forde’s background is not your run-of-the-mill one. She is the daughter of a pair of Assemblies of God pastors, who some years ago, opted to relocate to the Rupununi to preach the Gospel there.

When account is taken of the sustained squeeze that the Trump administration has placed on the administration of President Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela, targeting particularly the country’s oil & gas sector, the country can be considered as having been afforded some breathing space in recent months.

The creative community in the Caribbean is being afforded the opportunity to access funding through financing provided by The Cultural and Creative Indus-tries Innovation Fund (CIIF), which is administered by the Caribbean Development Bank.

While the legality and use of marijuana remains a hotly debated issue in some parts of the Caribbean and elsewhere around the world, Caribbean Community (CARICOM) member country Jamaica (as the Stabroek Business has been reporting) continues to parade to the rest of the region both the monetary and medicinal value of the plant commonly known as ‘ganja’.

The new Guyana Marketing Corporation has agreed to provide us with the above information which we will publish on a weekly basis subject to receipt.

This week’s disclosure that, in the period ahead, Guyana will be home to a US$75 million Marriott-branded hotel is probably not altogether surprising given what we are continually being told is likely to be the considerable levels of foreign investment that will come on the back of the emergence of our oil and gas industry.

Gold Prices for the three day period ending Thursday February 13, 2020          Kitco is a Canadian company that buys and sells precious metals such as gold, copper and silver.

GASCI (www.gasci.com/telephone Nº 223-6175/6) reports that session 864’s trading results showed consideration of $9,883,937 from 103,058 shares traded in 26 transactions as compared to session 863’s trading results which showed consideration of $42,443,102 from 76,212 shares traded in 20 transactions.

The Ministry of Education on Monday launched what may well be the most all-inclusive initiative up to this time to equip Guyanese with a working knowledge of aspects of the oil and gas sector when it unveiled its two on-line courses at an event held at the Arthur Chung Convention Centre.

A great many of the current and growing small business enterprises in areas that include agro-processing, craft, clothing, fabric design and foods, to name a few, had their origins in initiatives undertaken by individuals and groups of women from poor rural communities searching for ways to subsidise modest existing incomes through one form or another of self-employment.

Blinded perhaps by the headlights into which we glare directly and which, perhaps, cause us to see only the ‘bright side’ of the oil & gas story arising out of ExxonMobil’s huge and still growing oil finds offshore Guyana, there is every likelihood that we are inclined not to look too far beyond those prospects that have to do with our years of waiting for our oil ‘miracle.’

Just how far the influence of the United States extends in applying strong pressures on out-of-favour political administrations was again reflected last week when Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley broke the news to his country that what had promised to be an economically game-changing bilateral agreement between his country and Venezuela for the exploitation of a gas-rich area shared by the two countries had been put on hold.

The local private training institution, JTW Management Institute has rolled out its new suite of training programmes for the first half of  2020 which embraces disciplines ranging from basic proficiency in English and Mathematics to training in skills that better position persons for job-seeking pursuits as well as to enhance their chances of securing on-the-job promotion.

Kitco Market Data Gold Prices for the three day period ending Thursday February 6, 2020

*Prices only represent the average Wholesale Farmgate and Retail Prices at the above mentioned markets and are NOT prices set by the Guyana MArketing Corporation or Ministry of Agriculture.

GASCI (www.gasci.com/telephone Nº 223-6175/6) reports that session 863’s trading results showed consideration of $42,443,102 from 76,212 shares traded in 20 transactions as compared to session 862’s trading results which showed consideration of $16,499,485 from 160,768 shares traded in 39 transactions.

By yesterday morning and arising out of the latest in an unending series of management/worker confrontations between the majority-owned Russian bauxite behemoth and its Guyanese workers, there had reportedly arisen a standoff between residents of the Aroaima community and armed police, the issue that spawned this turn of events being the earlier blocking and unblocking of the Berbice River in the area of Kwakwani.

Continually growing international recognition of the size and commercial significance of Guyana’s recently unearthed oil and gas resources has again been reflected, this time, in this week’s announcement days by the United States-based global energy company Hess that the country could attract the lion’s share of its US$3 billion exploration and production budget for 2020.