“Dream big and think outside the box” – Tourism Minister tells Bartica students

Some 150 students of the Bartica and Three Mile Secondary schools in Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni) participated in the State of Entrepreneurship Survey which is being conducted by the Tourism, Industry and Commerce Ministry and targets students and business owners.
Speaking with students on Tuesday at the Bartica Secondary School, Tourism, Industry and Commerce Minister Oneidge Walrond challenged students to “dream big and think outside the box.”

The Minister stressed that small businesses are the drivers of wealth-creation in nations. She added that it is necessary to begin thinking about entrepreneurship from a young age. Walrond emphasised that entrepreneurship must not be considered as simply starting a business, but also about adding value and solutions to our communities outside of resources that might be immediately available.
Entrepreneurship, she pointed out, is also about meeting a need. She noted that schools are incubators of many ideas that can be monetised. “As your minds are young and agile, don’t get confined to a structure, think solutions. There are problems all around you; there are problems to be solved; that is how you think and how ideas are born,” the Minister told the students.
The Government, she added, is developing an Entrepreneurship Development and Innovation Fund to stimulate new innovation and new businesses. “We will support the research and development of those ideas. We will fund technical advice for you to bring those ideas into implementation, and possibly into a full-blown business that you can monetise,” she posited.

The Minister added that the Government wants to encourage students to get more involved in developing business and innovative ideas.
Meanwhile, Director of Business and Entrepreneurship, John Edghill, has said Government wants to understand the entrepreneurship aspirations of students. “We have crafted a very specific survey geared at understanding the spirit of entrepreneurship among our students,” Edghill explained.
He noted that information gathered from the survey would assist the Ministry in developing programmes and policies that can assist students in becoming entrepreneurs. “We believe that entrepreneurship is a pathway to having that life we want to live, and is also a pathway to developing the lives of other people who reside in our communities, including our families. So, we bring you the message of entrepreneurship,” Edghill declared.