New accelerator programme to strengthen Guyana’s wood-based SMEs

The Delegation of the European Union in Guyana, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the Centre for Local Business Development on Wednesday launched the Guyana Wood-Based SME Accelerator Programme 2025 – an ambitious initiative aimed at strengthening the capacity, competitiveness, and long-term sustainability of small and medium enterprises operating within Guyana’s wood-based sector.
Funded by the European Union and implemented by FAO with support from the Centre, the programme is designed to help entrepreneurs improve regulatory compliance, build business and leadership skills, and access new financing opportunities. The launch opened with a formal programme outlining the initiative and its call for applications, followed by a stakeholder workshop featuring members of the sector and financial institutions. That session focused on identifying the specific needs of wood-based SMEs and ensuring the Accelerator is tailored to address those gaps.
The first cohort of the Accelerator will run from January to September 2026, guiding participants through a structured five-phase programme that includes seminars, bootcamps, one-on-one coaching, financial matchmaking, and grant support.

Viable economic opportunities
EU Ambassador to Guyana and Suriname, Luca Pierantoni, emphasised that the forestry sector is built not only on the country’s rich forest resources but also on the people, entrepreneurs, community forestry groups, and indigenous-led enterprises who transform those resources into viable economic opportunities.
Highlighting the long-standing partnership between Guyana and the European Union, the Ambassador noted that forestry cooperation remains one of the strongest pillars of that relationship. He referenced the 2022 Forest Partnership Memorandum of Understanding, which focuses not only on protecting and restoring Guyana’s forests but also on ensuring those forests serve the country’s social and economic needs.
He also explained that the Wood-Based SME Accelerator exemplifies the economic dimension of the EU-Guyana forest partnership.
“The success of the forestry sector not only depends on trees, but on the people, the women and the men that work in the forestry sector… The European Union is proud to support this initiative and Guyanese forestry SMEs to help them grow in a way that is sustainable, competitive, and environmentally responsible. With these accelerators, the expectation is to improve the investment readiness of Guyanese wood-based SMEs, strengthening their business capacities, enhancing their access to finance, and increasing the investments in value-added forestry manufacturing in Guyana,” the EU Ambassador said.

Importance of wood-based industry
Meanwhile, Commissioner of the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC), Edward Goberdhan, in his remarks, welcomed the launch of the Wood-Based SME Accelerator Programme.
The commissioner underscored the importance of the wood-based industry to national development, pointing to its contributions in job creation, income generation, export earnings, and supply of raw materials for local manufacturing and construction. He highlighted that Guyana’s forests remain among the best managed globally, with consistently low rates of deforestation and illegal logging – a status supported by the country’s world-class wood-tracking system. With continued EU support, he added, the system will soon become fully digital, reflecting the President’s wider agenda for rapid digitisation across the economy.
Further, Guyana is currently in the implementation phase of the EU-FLEGT VPA process, with the goal of issuing licences by 2026. Goberdhan said this process has strengthened the sector’s legality and traceability systems, noting that legal and sustainable sourcing is fundamental to the credibility of the entire wood value chain. Strong legislation, backed by the LCDS 2030 framework, ensures that forest products meet local and international standards.
SMEs, he stressed, are major contributors to the forestry industry’s output. At the primary production level, they account for nearly 60 per cent of national production – equivalent to roughly 300,000 cubic metres annually. In the processing sub-sector, SMEs handle more than 150,000 cubic metres of raw materials each year, supplying export markets, the domestic construction sector, furniture manufacturers, and kiln-drying operations. For this reason, he welcomed the Accelerator’s focus on strengthening SME capacity and competitiveness.
He outlined the challenges faced by operators – capital-intensive production, difficult terrain, unpredictable weather, high transportation costs, labour shortages, and stiff competition from imported wood products. He emphasized the need for SMEs to prioritise the use of local timber, adopt lesser-known species, and maintain strict compliance with legality and sustainability requirements.
“So, we’d encourage the beneficiaries, the forest priorities for utilisation of local timber, and the processing value chain to ensure the utilisation of lesser-known species. Compliance is also very important. As I mentioned, timber must come from a legal and sustainable source, which is a key pillar of the local wood-based sector. Alliance to quality and standard is also a key market tool, and a happy one for the development of this programme will be enhanced readiness for sustainable forest management, including alliance to certification standards like the PEFC and FSC. Recognising the importance of quality and standards in the wood-based sector, the GFC has developed a code of practice for processing operations, which sets out minimum standards and guidelines, including health and safety, for operators in the processing sub-sector,” the Commissioner said.