Commercial delegation from Texas in Guyana to peruse investment opportunities

The Private Sector Commission (PSC) along with the Guyana Office for Investment (GO-Invest) on Monday held discussions with a delegation from the Bilateral Chamber of Commerce, Houston, Texas.
The delegation, headed by Chief Executive Officer of the Bilateral Chamber, Aida Araissi, is looking to promote trade, investment, training, and educational exchanges. Specifically, the team will be looking to advance talks in the areas of aviation, hospitality, land & equipment, civil engineering, oil & gas and agriculture.
In welcoming the Delegation, PSC Chairman, Paul Cheong said that Guyana welcomes foreign investment as it augurs well for the development of the private sector and the country as a whole.

Meanwhile, Araissi explained that over the next few days, the delegation will be assessing the needs of Guyana to see what expertise can be provided to support local content. The Chamber, she explained, has more than 24 years of building strategic alliances in key markets across the globe, providing a gateway to international trade, resources, partners and alliances.
“This has been an incredible morning. This is our first time in Guyana. We are the Bilateral Chamber. And we have a network of over 36,000 business people that are in our network. And we really just kind of hand selected a few diverse members, in agriculture, oil and gas, infrastructure, in ICT and in airport infrastructure, to kind of assess the needs of the country and what kind of expertise we can bring in, to support the local content needs,” she said.
According to Araissi, there are models in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and other countries, where economies went through astronomical changes after oil and gas was discovered. She noted that the chamber has experience in this.
“We understand the pieces of what would be needed, to make sure it’s a comprehensive and sustainable growth, for all involved. So, we’re excited… we’ve been briefed by the US embassy. We’ve been briefed by GO-Invest. And we’ve been briefed by the Private Sector Commission. And we feel like we have a lot of information and we’re beginning to understand,” Araissi further said.
It was only last month that a group of United Kingdom (UK) based businesses were in Guyana exploring opportunities in a variety of sectors that could see millions of dollars in investments being injected into the Guyanese economy. At the time, they also dubbed Guyana as the most exciting investment destination.
Managing Director of The Caribbean Council, Chris Bennett had outlined that some of the projects that are being floated would see multimillion-dollar investments being made here. Bennett had also said the Group was paying keen attention to the budget proceedings in the National Assembly and is excited about Government’s plans for investments in various sectors of the Guyanese economy.
He added that some of the companies that are a part of the mission could potentially play a really helpful part in driving those plans and helping to deliver them more quickly, more efficiently, in a more cost-effective way and potentially in a way that reduces carbon impact as well.
Bennet had also said that they have been looking at road expansion projects, hydro projects, investments in human capital, digital economy, wireless businesses and new brands such as the rum sector.