Training facility at the Guyana Tourism Authority’s Headquarters
The Guyana Tourism Authority (GTA) has established its first training facility to facilitate various types of training for operators within Guyana’s tourism sector.
In an interview with the Department of Public Information (DPI), GTA’s Manager of Training and Licensing, Tamika Inglis, noted that the agency offers more than 20 areas of training.
“We thought it was necessary that we have our own training room, so we put forward that plan and it has come to fruition, and we are pretty much excited about that. It would definitely cut our overhead cost as well as give us the opportunity to have more training done,” Inglis explained.
She added that the facility has been in the making for some time, as the outsourcing of venues to host training has been quite costly.
According to Inglis, the GTA prioritises training based on an assessment of the needs of the industry.
“So far, we would have been able to train 1300 persons to date, and…training covers mixology, first aid and CPR, delivering quality service, introduction to tourism, tour guiding, and birding. We have a whole list of training that we try to cover to build the capacity of the industry,” she explained.
Currently, persons who benefit from the training are already operating in the industry. However, because several hotels are slated to begin operating in the future, the interest is growing.
“Persons calling us every day asking for training in different areas; even areas that we don’t offer, like waitressing. What we are trying to do now, when these requests come, we see how best we could provide the training,” she added.
The GTA is also planning to develop a human resource database for the tourism industry, especially for the hotels that would begin operating in Guyana.
“We do have plans to develop…a human resource database for tourism, where we’re not only training persons that are already in the industry and working in the industry, but persons who have a desire to enter the industry. And as you know, we have a whole host of hotels coming on board. So, what we want to do is be able to have a pool of persons that are trained in various tourism areas or hospitality areas, so those hotels can actually pull from that pool,” she explained.
1,500 persons have been trained by the GTA in 2021, and more than 2,000 in 2022. This year’s number of persons targeted for training is 3500.
