THE Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI), yesterday, put out its first manifesto which identifies 20 barriers to Guyana’s competitiveness. They include ensuring political and economic stability, enacting local government reform and holding elections, transforming the University of Guyana (UG) and expanding training and educational opportunities, establishing a development bank and enacting modern intellectual property laws.
Speaking at the introduction, in its Waterloo Street, North Cummingsburg, Georgetown boardroom, GCCI President, Mr. Clinton Urling said the documentation represents a culmination of feedback gathered from membership, members of academia and business leaders and sectoral organisations.
According to him, both the public and private sectors need to identify key areas of weaknesses that pose the most challenges and reduce those to ensure global competitiveness.
Urling maintained that, with Guyana’s population, firms need to look globally for markets, since domestic ones are not sufficient for any company to be competitive in the international arena of this globalised world.
He said any issues on which the GCCI will be pronouncing its position would be traced back to the foundation of any one of the 20 identified constraints.
“So if there is any issue out there, in the public realm, that goes towards reducing any of these 20 identified barriers, the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry will support those initiatives,” Urling assured.

FIRST PHASE
He said that the policy declaration represents the first phase, in which diagnoses of the main issues affecting Guyana’s competitiveness have been done and the second will involve the identifying of specific activities and actions that would help to reduce these obstacles.
Urling gave the assurance that the GCCI would work with all of the various national stakeholders, as well as the Government of Guyana, in an effort to devise strategies for reducing such constraining factors.
He said, some time before year end or early next year, they will have a detailed list of some of the initiatives.
Urling noted that, in the last seven years, the country’s economy has experienced continuous, uninterrupted economic growth, due, mainly, to national factor endowment and the very prudent macro-economic management of the economy by the Government.
This, he said, has resulted in Guyana improving its competitive status from where it was about 25 years ago and positioning itself from a very low-income economy to a transitional economy.