THOUGH Portuguese-Guyanese represent less than one per cent of Guyana’s population, their contributions to the Guyanese economy is well felt, particularly in the area of business where they have a well-established reputation as adept entrepreneurs.
Businesses like Banks DIH Limited started by Peter D’Aguiar and John Fernandes Limited (JFL) started by John Fernandes are just a few of the remaining businesses that are remnants of a time when Portuguese dominated Guyana’s business sector.
Houston Estates which was owned by the Veiras, as well as businesses owned by the Alphonso family are also some of the well-known Portuguese family businesses that come to mind whenever one thinks about what remains of the glory days of Portuguese businesses in Guyana.

When Portuguese left the indentureship life of the plantation, many turned to huckster and retail trade, with particular involvement in rum production and sales.
The end of the 1860s and the 1870s saw the Portuguese well entrenched in business, Portuguese Guyanese historian Noel Menezes noted in one of her news articles. However, the business landscape of today is starkly different, with the few remaining Portuguese-Guyanese managed and owned businesses in Guyana. It represents a shadow of the predominance that Portuguese-Guyanese once held in Guyana.
“The Portuguese who were vibrant in the 1940s and 50s are all overseas. The number of Portuguese businesses that remain vibrant today you can’t count past 10,” explained Christopher “Chris” Fernandes.

Chris is the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of JFL and son of John Fernandes.
The Portuguese population, and, by extension, businesses, declined in the 1960s and 70s when Guyana saw mass migration. While the migration affected all the ethnic groups in the country at the time, the brunt of the effect was borne by those ethnicities that were smallest in numbers, the Portuguese-Guyanese being among them.
“This [migration] was not a Portuguese thing, it was generally [all ethnicities]. It’s just that the other ethnicities were so many that they were ok when they lost a couple thousand each. But when a couple thousand Chinese or Portuguese left it was a lot of people percentage wise,” Chris explained.
Though Portuguese-Guyanese numbered approximately 30,000 at their peak, this has since considerably declined. In the 2012 census Portuguese in Guyana number less than 2000 persons.

JFL remains a thriving business in Guyana today due to the sheer determination and patriotism of Chris’ father.
“My father was committed to Guyana and he always thought there was a future for Guyanese in their homeland,” he said, noting that at times people would even question why his father chose to stay when so many were leaving.
“It was easy to get into Canada, the States, England and some people even went to the Caribbean, because at the time the future in Guyana did not look bright. But my father always believed that Guyana had a prosperous future. A lot of the Portuguese families and business persons were leaving for greener pastures, supposedly, but my old man said I’m going to stay here and one day we are going to prosper,” Chris told the Guyana Chronicle.

The business, which started as just a shipping business, has since expanded significantly and today is involved in livestock, rice, distribution and more recently, oil and gas support service. According to Chris, two key secrets to the success of the business was keeping it as a family business and placing high emphasis on employee welfare.  “We’ve been able to educate our family members, locally and when necessary overseas and been able to encourage them to come back and serve our company and by extension the country so that we have a large percentage of our management made up of family members. Not that we don’t have others, we have a number of competent individuals,” Chris related.  On employee welfare, he said “We try to consider our employees to be special and we treat them special. We think employees are our asset and their welfare is important to us.”