A HIGH-LEVEL mission from the World Bank is here in Guyana to conduct an assessment of the country ahead of the formulation of a country strategy.

On Friday, the delegation, which is probably the largest to ever visit Guyana from the international financial institution, met with Finance Minister, Winston Jordan. Shortly after exiting that meeting, Minister Jordan told reporters that the mission initiated discussions on the development of a country strategy. “Their principle aim was to start the discussions leading to a country strategy. They haven’t done this for a very long time, in fact, this will be the first in a couple decades,” Minister Jordan said.

Ahead of the compilation of the strategy, a comprehensive assessment of the country’s economic, social, institution and regulatory frameworks is required. “They are here to do a lot of that background work. So I had a preliminary discussion with them this morning on those. Quite informative discussion and these will continue during next week,” he disclosed.
The Sovereign Wealth Fund was among topics that came up for discussion when the high-level meeting was held. The finance minister explained that the Sovereign Wealth Fund Legislation forms part of the preconditions for the second tranche from the US$90M loan facility the World Bank has made available to the country for the next three years.
Last July, the government received the first tranche in the sum of US$35M. The loan, which is a development policy credit, will provide financing on the basis of action which Guyana has already undertaken with regard to financial and fiscal stability; and under the conditionality that Guyana maintains an adequate macroeconomic policy framework.
The finance minister is optimistic that once the preconditions are met, by the first half of 2018, Guyana will be able to receive the second tranche. Zooming in on the pending Sovereign Wealth Fund, Minister Jordan disclosed that the World Bank officials were presented with the latest draft of the Sovereign Wealth Fund Bill.

“They raised a number of points before they saw the draft, but based on the green paper, they were sure that a number of points that they raised are actually in the legislation. We then shared the legislation with them, they will go through it with our people and they will point to areas that they feel need further elaboration, strengthening or further definition,” Minister Jordan explained.

He said the ongoing consultation on the proposed legislation is in keeping with government’s thrust to have a piece of legislation that is strong and transparent. The legislation, he said, will be laid in the National Assembly within weeks. “We are on track with keeping our promise to have it in Parliament before the end of the year,” he posited.
The Green paper titled “Managing Future Petroleum Revenues and Establishment of Fiscal Rule and a Sovereign Wealth Fund,” was presented to the National Assembly last August by Minister Jordan. The Green Paper is being issued by the government to present preliminary proposals to stimulate discussion as it details specific issues while pointing out possible courses of action in terms of policy and legislation.

Stabilisation, savings and domestic development are the key objectives of the fund and the fiscal rule options outlined in the ‘Green’ paper, Finance Minister had said when he laid the paper in the House. Feedback on the ‘Green’ paper will inform the next stage, which is the presentation of the SWF legislation to the National Assembly before the end of 2018.