…growth rate pegged to robust construction activity

GUYANA has been ranked among the Caribbean’s fastest growing economies for 2018 recording a 3.4 per cent growth, according to the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB).

The announcement was made by CDB President, Dr. William Warren Smith at the Bank’s Annual News Conference on Thursday at its headquarters in Barbados. The two other countries singled out were Grenada with 5.2 per cent growth and Antigua and Barbuda with 3.5 percent. “In the case of Grenada, its strong performance continues to be a five-year positive trend that averages around five per cent. For Antigua and Barbuda and some of the other borrowing members that were affected by the 2017 hurricane season, reconstruction efforts contributed in large part to their upturn,” he began.

“Growth in Guyana was linked mainly to robust construction activity in advance of the first commercial production of oil in 2020.” These and other factors have led the bank to forecast a positive economic outlook for its Borrowing Member Countries (BMC) in 2019.

“Despite projections of deceleration in global economic activity, the 2019 economic outlook for our borrowing members is, in our judgement, a positive one,” Dr Smith said. “CDB’s projecting that real GDP growth will be around two per cent as construction, tourism and the extractive industries such as gold and oil are expected to expand.”

However, in order to achieve this, Dr. Smith stated that BMCs will need to make improvements in the areas of climate change; wide fiscal deficits and high public debt and high unemployment. In his presentation, the CDB president reported that one in every four youths in the Caribbean are unable to find work according to the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

However, unemployment fell to an all-time low in Jamaica at 8.4 per cent in July 2018 as a result of improvements in the business environment and in macro-economic stability.

Meanwhile, programmes like the US$75M Barbados Economic Recovery and Transformation (BERT) Plan helped to restore economic stability and achieve sustained growth in the country. Dr Smith stated: “All CDB’s efforts to build climate resilience; to strengthen energy security and to address high debt, put people first. How do we achieve this? We do so by targeting our funding and projects that are designed specifically to address the critical social issues associated with high unemployment; income inequality and citizen insecurity.”

However, the CDB noted that the year did not pass without its challenges, as it saw several setbacks caused by natural disasters and the harsh reality of low public project implementation rates in the Region, as much as 20 per cent. Working to address the latter, the CDB has investigated regional and global best practices to achieving better results while country-specific solutions will be pursued in 2019.

Meanwhile, other projects the CBD has assisted Guyana with over the years include Guyana’s West Coast Demerara Road Improvement project; the Sea and River Defence Project and the Basic Needs Trust Fund (BNTF) Programme among others. For 2018 alone, the bank approved projects totalling US$352M, while disbursements totalled US$280M, representing a 20 per cent increase in funding compared to 2017.