Budget 2026 to chart path to delivering manifesto promises

As preparations continue on the country’s fiscal plan for next year, Senior Minister with Responsibility for Finance, Dr Ashni Singh says that Budget 2026 will chart the pathway for the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Administration to deliver its promises made in the 2025 Elections Manifesto. During an appearance on the latest episode of the Starting Point podcast, Minister Singh was asked about what Guyanese can expect from the national budget that is likely to be presented in January 2026. Without going into details about specific interventions or policy initiatives, the Finance Minister explained that the PPP/C Government has prided itself on policy clarity and policy continuity while in office and has been very clear about what it intends to do over the next five years. “Before the 2025 General [and Regional] Elections on the 1st of September, we stated in writing in a document the things that we plan to do over the course of the next five years…our Manifesto for the coming term of office. And every budget in this coming term of office will have as its principal objective the delivery of the commitments that we gave in our manifesto. The national budget for 2026 is, of course, the first budget since we’ve been re-elected. And so, what this budget is going to do is it’s going to put us on a path where we will see over the course of the next five years the delivery of every single commitment that we’ve made in our Manifesto,” Dr Singh posited.

2025-2030 Manifesto
Back in August, the governing PPP/C launched its 2025-2030 Manifesto, outlining an ambitious five-year development agenda aimed at transforming Guyana into a modern and international model of growth. Themed “One Country, One People, One Future Forward Together for a Better Guyana”, the manifesto outlined plans for the next five years ranging from building 12 hospitals and deploying a fully integrated Emergency Medical Services (EMS) system across the country; the construction of 40,000 new homes; major roadworks, and an aviation school, to constructing a deep-water port; 100 new schools; a Small and Medium-sized Enterprise (SME) Development Bank; an anti-corruption unit, and initiatives for Indigenous development, among others. Only last month, it was reported that the Finance Ministry was in the advanced stages of sorting through submissions made by the various Ministries and state agencies for the 2026 National Budget.
Dr Singh had told reporters on the sidelines of an event that, “The next few weeks will be a very intense period of effort. We will continue the work that will see us being able to submit the budget in Parliament very early in the new year. The budget will see us beginning to deliver immediately on the commitments that we gave in the manifesto because it is our intention in this term of office to continue to do as we have always done, which is to ensure that we deliver our entire manifesto to the people of Guyana.” According to the Finance Minister, all Ministries and Government agencies had already prepared and submitted their initial budget proposals. These submissions expand on the manifesto’s commitments, providing detailed policy objectives and outlining programmes to be undertaken in the new term.

Consultations
Meanwhile, consultations have been held with various stakeholders including the local private sector. In fact, the Private Sector Commission (PSC) is gearing up to submit its proposal to the Finance Ministry in which it will push for a series of pro-business measures, including reduced taxes, expanded incentives and streamlined migrant-worker policies. PSC Chairman Captain Gerald Gouveia Jr outlined the organisation’s key priorities for Budget 2026 during a press conference last week, emphasising that the proposals reflect consultations with private-sector bodies, regional chambers, and corporate members across the country. Gouveia said the umbrella private sector body’s budget recommendations are currently being finalised. “2026 budget submissions are being compiled as we speak to be submitted. And with that comes consultation from across the different private sector business support organisations and regional chambers, as well as our corporate members for their input so that we can prepare a comprehensive list that is backed by evidence as to what measures we would like to see included in Budget 2026… In general, it’ll be things like tax reductions in business operations. It’ll be incentives for business communities. It could be things like examining areas of promoting migrant workers in Guyana,” the PSC Chairman said. He added, “What we have found is that we need help in terms of the manpower, the technology to continue to grow the economy at the pace that we’ve been growing it at. So in terms of the incentives that we’re asking for, it’s going to be looking at the process of bringing in migrant workers, streamlining that process from a legislative perspective, as well as from a financial perspective, the financial economic implications of foreign work in Guyana.”

Incentives
When questioned about better wages for local workers, Gouveia said the private-sector wage environment is already rising well above the legal minimum, but PSC is also pressing for the modernisation of employee-benefit taxation.
“So, I think the market is doing its job in terms of regulating the cost of labour and raising the minimum wage in accordance with the market movement. Incentives – a lot of it is going to come back to our recommendations in terms of looking at income tax thresholds, looking at everything from corporation tax to incentives, allowances for employees, how we can better transfer their take-home salaries to them. So, a lot of our recommendations is asking the Government to re-look at a lot of the employee benefit packages that we offer and then offering some mechanisms for that to become an opportunity for tax deductions or incentives for companies to offer higher benefits for their employees,” he had noted.
Under the theme “A Secure, Prosperous and Sustainable Guyana”, the PPP/C Government presented a whopping $1.382 trillion budget on January 17, 2025, marking the second budget in Guyana’s history to cross the trillion-dollar mark and containing a wave of measures aimed at not only moving the economy forward but also bringing direct benefits to Guyanese.