THE Guyana Tourism Authority (GTA) and the Tourism and Hospitality Association of Guyana (THAG) on Thursday officially formalised their partnership with the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) at a ceremony held at the OMG Restaurant on Sheriff Street, Georgetown.

Both working with a mandate of developing the tourism industry, THAG and GTA have been partnering for some years now but have never formally entered into an agreement to work together.

THAG is a private sector-organised umbrella body of several tourism related entities in Guyana, while GTA is a semi-autonomous governmental organisation operating under the Ministry of Business.

“A structured approach of this nature will ensure that our efforts are complementary and mutually reinforcing. This takes it to another level,” explained GTA Director, Brian Mullis, moments before signing the MoU.

“Partnerships are the norm in tourism destinations around the world and we certainly want to ensure that’s the norm here in Guyana.” With the MoU now in place, the two entities can now pool their resources and efforts towards a more meaningful outcome. The entities will no longer have to apply for the same resources separately.

“So the Ministry of Finance gets one list of top priorities to help to improve the enabling environment for tourism. We are also looking to prioritize infrastructure development. There’s a lot that the Ministry of Public Infrastructure is already doing, but now we have a chance to come to the table together to direct what priorities are from the tourisms industry’s stand point,” Mullis further said.

The signing of the MoU comes as the tourism month celebrations continue. GTA and THAG just recently jointly launched their “Weekend Getaway” initiative, and shortly after the signing together, launched the Guyana Restaurant Week.
Signing on behalf of THAG was its president, Mitra Ramkumar, who commended the example the tourism industry was setting for government-private sector linkages.
“This is an area I think that could be used across Guyana of how the authority can work with the private sector in the interest of building the industry. This MoU, it’s a way of saying we are going to move this industry forward to its rightful place as the new frontier industry in Guyana,” Ramkumar noted.

“The MoU is just to formalise what already exists and avoid duplication of efforts, ensure that everything we do is aligned and so we get better results from our resources that we have now. We want to ensure that we be strategic.”

Ramkumar is very happy with how the MoU has been put together and what will come from it going forward. Nonetheless, he is not ruling out amendments to the MoU should the need arise, given the developing nature of the industry.

“It covers all the areas in terms of capacity building and training, marketing, cluster development, product development. I really don’t see any area that is missing at this point but the tourism industry is a dynamic industry; it grows, and it involves everyone. We will have regular engagements to ensure this MoU works, and it’s going to be a living MoU, in that if there are other areas that need to be addressed, we will address them and we will, if we need to, amend the MoU,” he declared.