THE Administration of Region Five (Mahaica/Berbice) has commenced rolling out its $3.7B budget for 2019.
Regional Executive Officer, Mr Ovid Morrison, disclosed that the Regional Procurement and Tender Administration Board (RPTAB) opened bids for some $154 M worth of projects in the first wave of implementation of its work programme for 2019, on Tuesday.

He said that over 350 bids received from contractors are currently being processed with efforts being made to expedite the awarding of contracts in order to make way for the second wave of execution of the administrations work program for 2019. Upgrading, rehabilitation and construction of community roads valued at $105M; education infrastructure projects valued at $29M and health care improvement projects valued at $19M, were among the tenders opened.

The initial wave of programmes for public works comprised a total of sixteen community roads from Blairmont in the east of the region, to Perth Mahaicony in the west, which will be upgraded. Some tenders valued at a total cost of $23M were received for upgrades in the education sector with respect to schools and their environment, mainly improvements with respect to fences and tarmacs.

Tenders were opened for the construction of guard huts at eleven schools within the region, at an average cost of $504,000 each. Invitations to tender for the construction of guard huts were deliberately restricted to small and start-up contractors so the “smaller guys” could get a piece of the pie, Morrison said. Tenders were opened for eight projects in the health sector in the region at total value of $19M; most of which are mainly upgrades to health centres in communities throughout the region.

In December 2018, the $3.7B awarded to Region Five by central government in its Budget 2019, tenders for public perceived $382Million; healthcare $844Million; education $1.9Billion and agriculture $300Million.