Nation-building is paramount

In 2013, the Government of Guyana was the recipient of funding from the Inter-American Development Bank to engage in studies for the construction of a road to facilitate the movement of goods from northern Brazil to Port Georgetown. This study has been completed and its final results were handed over to the Government a little over a week ago.

In delivering the Government’s remarks at a ceremony held to hand over the Report, Minister of Public Infrastructure David Patterson said, among other things, that: “Guyana can increase the competitiveness of its exports, and lower maritime cost. Guyana can also benefit from stimulating activity along the road leading to regional economic benefit in terms of employment and GDP. When we also take into account the need for tolling, this may also take another dimension of economic returns for Guyana.”

In the 1970s when the project for building such a road was conceptualised, the objective of the Forbes Burnham Administration was to link the communities in Region Seven, Eight, Nine and Ten with easy access to Georgetown, for the growth and development of Guyana and Guyanese.
Such linkages had at its primary aim to open markets, primary and secondary, for local produce. For example this road is supposed to facilitate food grown in the hinterland moving to the mainland; improving and optimising the logging industry in Region Seven, Eight, Nine and Ten; miners and traders travelling not only in comfort but shorter time to and from various locations.

It was felt too that with the road infrastructure, wastage would have been minimised, since it would have been easier for producers and sellers to move their products to and from the marketplace.
Notwithstanding the justification now being used to build this road, now dubbed the Georgetown/Brazil road, Guyana cannot lose sight of maximising opportunities for its indigenous development. Direct efforts to ensure sustainable economic development for Guyanese must not be lost sight of, though it is recognised primacy is being given to facilitating Brazil having access to the Atlantic port at shorter time. In addition to Guyana, Guyanese must also be major beneficiaries.

Prioritisation of things that matter to Guyana and Guyanese is important to nation building and forging the sense of nationhood from which nationalism springs. Guyana cannot afford to pay the price where our interests are put on the backburner, our culture face erosion, our resources exploited not to our benefit, citizens’ rights transgressed, and more so keeping persons trapped in perpetual poverty.
It is to the nation and its people’s advantage should its Government place emphasis on linking the hinterland communities with the capital as matter of policy and priority. The benefits to be derived from such focus not only stand to increase production and productivity within and around communities, but also population movement and development with the increasing movement of skills and talents from around Guyana, and easier movement of goods and improvement in services both ways.

The hinterland communities have a high level of poverty. Building infrastructures to benefit these communities will create employment and economic opportunities, direct and indirect. Region Seven, Eight, Nine and Ten can also play a more assertive role in Guyana improving and competing in products such as cashew nuts, palm oil, guava cheese and fruit juices which are in demand in the marketplace, local and international.
The objective of any developmental project reaps greater dividends when it starts with Guyanese as the focus. When the indigenous objectives are being met, the benefits derived by country and partners are assured.

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