Govt looking to add 100,000 women to labour force – Jagdeo

…says aggressive training underway to increase employment

The Government is optimistic that it can add approximately 100,000 people, mostly Guyanese women, to the labour force and it is making an aggressive push to do so, through training.
This is according to Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo, during a recent press conference where he referenced the International Organisation for Migration’s (IOM) 2022 country report. He read the section of the report which states that if Guyana were to harness all of its unemployed, underemployed and discouraged workers, the potential supply of labour would be only 63,500 in the medium term.
Jagdeo further noted that according to the report, it is estimated that Guyana would need approximately 160,000 workers. Based on the report, it would mean that at minimum, 100,000 workers in Guyana would be needed for the country to realise its full growth potential. According to Jagdeo, however, the Government is optimistic that Guyana could harness even more labour than the IOM estimates, especially if more women enter the formal workforce.
“Now the IOM has done some good work on manpower survey. But we don’t agree with everything. We believe we can increase the supply of domestic labour by bringing in more people, by more than 63,000. That’s why we’re working on special projects to get more women.”
“We think if we can get more rural and more rural women, maybe hinterland women and some urban by providing day care with the kids, then we can add probably just in female labour participation, maybe 100,000 of our people, to the labour force.”
For some time, there have been reports of labour shortage in various sectors. The possibility of importing labour has also been explored. According to Jagdeo, however, the Government is still holding out in the hopes of ensuring more Guyanese take up these employment opportunities.
“That is why we’ve been saying, we are not moving at a full pace, to bring in labour. Because if we were to take this report, we should allow 100,000 people to come here, but we’re not doing that. We’re very judicious, because we’re saying first of all our people must be employed. We’re trying to bring more people into the labour force through training programmes.”
“We have an aggressive training programme in the Ministry of Labour. We have about 17,000 people on scholarships now, through the GOAL programme. There’s lots of these activities going on, to bring our own people into the labour force. And more and more Guyanese are working now,” Jagdeo said.
The Vice President’s remarks come on the heels of a push by some sectors to import labour. However, the Vice President has consistently noted that while Government is allowing foreign workers to come in for certain projects, this is not being done at a scale that will disenfranchise Guyanese.
“There are a large number of people who are trying to bring in labourers. We’ve been very cautious in giving large scale permits. They have to demonstrate a need and they have to now show that the project would be adversely affected before we give the permission,” he had said at a previous press conference.
Some of the large-scale projects that have been given permission to import labour are the India-funded Ogle, East Coast Demerara, to Eccles (East Bank Demerara) bypass road project and the new Demerara River bridge project that is being undertaken by a Chinese contractor – China Railway and Construction Corporation (CRCC) Limited.
“We know the demand is still growing and [so we’re] allowing selective projects to bring in their labour like the road projects. They’re complaining that they have a timeline to deliver the road – the Indian company or the Chinese company on the bridge… they bring in labourers to work on those projects,” Jagdeo had stated.
Guyana Times understands that CRCC brought in Bangladeshi workers who had built the FIFA World Cup stadiums in Qatar last year. Since India is financing the bypass road, there is a stipulation that a certain per cent of Indians are contracted to workers on the project. (G3)