EMPLOYMENT is essential to human development as it provides financial resources for the generation of sustainable livelihoods, thereby improving the standard of living and quality of life for citizens. In Guyana, youth unemployment remains a central issue. Recognising this, President David Granger and his administration have designed a two-pronged approach to youth empowerment in the form of entrepreneurship and education.

In this two-part series of Government in Action, we will take a look at the Government’s efforts aimed at not only creating jobs, but the promotion of agro-processing and entrepreneurship and the opportunities and financial support available for young entrepreneurs, particularly at the Small Business Bureau (SBB) and through other programmes facilitated by the various Ministries.

Empowerment through entrepreneurship
While training and vocational education will no doubt empower a generation of talented young people, who in most cases just need a second chance, this administration has demonstrated that it is interested in inculcating a culture of industry and entrepreneurship. In this regard, programmes have been developed to provide the necessary support for budding entrepreneurs, while others focus on skills training to aid in employment ability.

In the area of entrepreneurship, programmes such as the Linden Enterprise Network (LEN), which was launched in December 2016, provide support to young people aspiring along these lines. The programme provides entrepreneurs across Linden and other parts of the Upper Demerara-Berbice Region with the opportunity to access loans to further expand or consolidate their businesses. At that event, President Granger in his address to the entrepreneurs said that the programme will open new doors for occupation through self-employment, adding that there are four pillars necessary for enterprise: investment, information, infrastructure and innovation.

The President said that the government wants to create an environment, which can provide the facilities for young people to be self-employed.

“We are bringing all the youth programmes together to have a common core curriculum so that every child, whether or not he or she is a school dropout, who enters that programme will get common training, which will prepare him or her to get employment in Guyana. I don’t like to see young children, some of them who have left secondary school in the Rupununi for example, drifting over to Brazil to do menial work. I think they can stay here and get a good living, not only because oil is on the horizon but because we can produce practically every food that the Eastern Caribbean needs. The country is wide open and it is open to you… Your education will not only equip you for employment but it will also equip you for entrepreneurial activities so that you can become rich,” the Head of State said at a youth luncheon held at State House in January 2018.

Another such programme is the SLED initiative, which was launched in September 2016 by the Government of Guyana under the Ministry of Communities as a means of introducing job-creation measures to promote micro and small-scale enterprises so as to open opportunities for the disadvantaged and the county’s youth. Through this initiative, scores of young people are given the chance to tap into resources that allow them to become business owners. The initiative has, since its implementation, enabled more than 100 youth business start-ups from among the Essequibo Islands-West Demerara (Region Three), Demerara-Mahaica (Region Four), Mahaica-Berbice (Region Five), East Berbice-Corentyne (Region Six) and the Upper Demerara-Berbice (Region 10) regions.

President David Granger, who delivered the feature address at that event, said that the answer to tackling unemployment can be found through investments in education and entrepreneurship and the SLED Initiative is a part of that investment.

“The SLED Initiative is part of a programme that reinforces the administration’s efforts to stimulate economic development in communities, especially at the grass root level. It has provided training, mentorship, business development skills and start-up grants to individuals and groups,” President Granger said on that occasion.

Minister of Communities, Mr Ronald Bulkan, in his remarks, said the origin of the SLED Initiative is contained in the vision of President David Granger, who at the time of expressing this vision was Opposition Leader, and who spoke of the challenges facing the country’s young people, including the high rate of unemployment. He said that the beneficiaries and entrepreneurs were among the first to take advantage of this helping hand offered by the Government.

“This initiative tries to ensure that we don’t leave anyone out of the loop of having that better life. Every intervention ensures that there is a level of training, mentoring and technical support, even after the project is completed. Building the capacity, ability and the right to earn and sustain a livelihood of the most vulnerable in society would be futile and unsustainable, if that is not complemented by institutional strengthening at a local government and community level that can offer support mechanisms and services to strengthen local economic activities at a grassroots level,” he said.

The Small Business Bureau
In his 2018 National Budget presentation, Minister of Finance, Mr Winston Jordan said that the Administration recognises the important role that entrepreneurship and by extension, the private sector, play in generating employment and income. It is imperative, therefore, that the Government continues to strengthen the fabric of micro and small businesses, especially those owned by vulnerable groups, through the alleviation of prohibitive constraints, he said. This is where the Small Business Bureau (SBB) plays a critical role.

Chief Executive Officer of the SBB, Dr. Lewell Porter, in an interview with the Public Information and Press Services Unit of the Ministry of the Presidency, said that the agency is mandated to not only assist small businesses to develop but is also responsible for helping them to access financing for their businesses and to advocate for Policy development, which can grow and develop this sector.

In terms of financing, Dr. Porter said that the Bureau provides grants starting from 300,000 to one million dollars to young entrepreneurs, who have viable ideas once they fulfil the established requirements.

“We require you to, first of all, be a registered kind of the small business and when you do that, we verify a couple of things because the Small Business Act defines the small business as any business that has less than 25 employees and the gross annual revenues is less than 16 million and the business assets is less than $20 million so as long as you meet two of those requirements, you can be registered as a small business. You come to us with a business side to your plan. We will sit down with you and try to understand the viability and the sustainability of that plan and if you benefit from a loan or a grant. Grants are usually for a startup to just give that impetus to continue in their effort, so the grant process is simple. We will come to do a site visit to ensure that you are who you say, whatever you said to us is correct, this is our verification process and then from that, we come back and there is a committee that meet and then they say whether that persons get a grant or not,” Dr. Porter said.

In addition to this, the SBB helps small business owners to access loans at Republic Bank (Guyana) Limited (RBGL) and the Guyana Bank for Trade and Industry (GBTI) for the expansion of their businesses.

The SBB provides the technical assistance in completing the application and helping the individual to acquire all necessary documentation to access a loan. It also issues a referral letter to the bank for the client. In addition to this, it provides 70 percent of the capital for the small business borrower.

Dr. Porter noted that since the inception of the programme in 2014, approximately 173 loans have been approved and more than 530 grants given out. For 2018 alone, more than 50 grants have been approved and 17 loans facilitated.

Approximately 40 percent of the Bureau’s clients are young people between the ages of 18-35. The CEO said that the SBB recognises that young people play a critical role in the development of the country and in most cases, need someone with the financial capabilities to support their creativity and vision. The Small Business Bureau, he said, is more than happy to play this role.

“I think the Small Business Bureau has an exceptional role here in the development of small businesses. Let’s say specifically youth, I personally believe that small businesses are the backbone of any economy and with all these business ideas that we have floating around, if we look back at some of the richest persons in the world today they had a simple idea, their ideas were sometimes shut down but then somebody came up and said “you know what? Let me put 10,000 into your fund to help you”. So, in the same way, we’re trying to help you, so it’s young people we are targeting to come up with all of these fantastic ideas and to see how we can help them grow. So come down to us, let us help our young people to develop into something fantastic,” he said.

In addition to financing opportunities, the Bureau also arranges training sessions for small business owners to hone their skills. While specialised training are offered in some areas, it also focuses on generic business training areas including how to develop a business idea, how to write a business plan, how to record financial information, marketing and dealing with clients.

“We also do specific business training. We have a sustainable mining programme, sustainable forestry training. We did cosmetology training because we believe that there is a need for having a higher level of cosmetologists here in Guyana so we hired a consultant from the United States and it was excellent. An excellent programme, free of cost for everybody attending. We just don’t want to be able to say that we gave out twenty million in loans but what was done with that money, we want to make sure that it is contributing to betterment of those entrepreneurs,” the CEO said.

Minister Jordan in his Budget 2018 speech, said that additional support to micro and small businesses will be delivered in 2018, through the creation of business incubators and accelerators in Regions 5 and 9 at a cost of $36 million. These structures will foster the growth of businesses by facilitating the provision of support services, such as business registration, documentation, and capacity building.

Meanwhile, the sum of $100 million has been allocated in Budget 2018 to replenish the Small Business Development Fund. This will be managed by the SBB.

Such initiatives will help to mould Guyana’s future and they reinstate the government’s commitment to ensuring ‘a good life for all’ through education, employment and enterprise. Moreover, as time progresses, through the Government’s commitment, we will see the introduction of more such programmes that aim to ensure that the country’s young people indeed get the chance to enjoy this good life. The President believes that such initiatives help in overcoming the problem of unemployment and will also help to create a generation of young people who will become the new entrepreneurial class.

In next week’s programme, we will take a look at the Government’s efforts in promoting vocational education as a means of empowerment and independence for the youth population.