–to create employment for over 50 people

IN anticipation of a construction boom locally, developer, Lorenzo Alphonso, has set out to establish a $620 million quarry project in the Cuyuni Mining District, in Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni).

The area identified for this project is located 11.5 kilometers west of the confluence of the Cuyuni and Mazaruni Rivers, between the Upper and Lower Kamaira Landings. According to the Institute of Quarrying, this activity involves the process of removing rock, sand, gravel or other minerals from the ground, in order to use them to produce materials for construction or other purposes.

Quarrying is any such work on the surface of the earth where minerals are extracted. Quarries are also known by other names around the world, such as, ‘Surface mine’, ‘pit’, and ‘open pit’, or ‘open-cast mine’.

The institute says that materials produced by quarrying are essential to everyday life, as they provide the construction materials needed to build roads and buildings, delivering vital minerals to agriculture, and supporting the generation of electricity among other things.

During an interview with the Sunday Chronicle, Alphonso said: “This quarry initiative was done after His Excellency [Dr. Irfaan Ali] urged the need for more stone producers to keep up with the construction of infrastructure.”

To fully operationalise the project, it would cost over $620 million, but the initial investment will be just about $200 million, he related.
Alphonso explained that the Kamaira Quarry will first target a portion of land demarcated as “Site A”, which has an estimated resource of 5,130,000 tonnes of rip-rap, aggregate granite and gneiss rocks.

“Some 300,000 to as much as 450,000 tonnes of stone will be mined and produced annually from the Kamaira Quarry over a mine life of five years,” Alphonso said.
Should he receive all the requisite approvals, the investor is hoping to commence operations in the first quarter of next year.

“I am currently awaiting one more approval to get the quarry mobilised,” he said, noting that once it is operational, there will be jobs for over 50 people.

Such investments are opportune, given that President Ali had said that there is room for advancement in the quarrying industry. Speaking about the potential for advancement in the local quarrying industry, President Ali had said: “Guyana has a huge quarry potential that has been greatly underdeveloped. Our accelerated housing programme, massive highways and community roads to be developed will increase our demand three-fold over the next five years.”

In order to maximise local benefits, create jobs, and expand local content through this industry, the government is in the process of issuing new quarrying licences, so as to fully satisfy local demand.

Last year, the mining and quarrying sector is estimated to have expanded by 303.7 per cent, and, based on available statistics, this sector is projected to grow by 39.1 per cent in 2021, driven by growth across all industries, namely, oil, gold, bauxite, and other mining and quarrying enterprises.

Growth in those sectors is expected to be stimulated through widespread public and private investments in infrastructure.

On the public side, according to Minister within the Ministry of Public Works Deodat Indar, the current budget for infrastructure represents $32.9 billion, or 32 per cent, of the total capital expenditure for the country for 2021. The country’s aggregate capital expenditure for this year is $103 billion.

This investment, according to the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) in its message following the announcement of Budget 2021, provides the financial grounding for the “build-out” of the country’s infrastructure, and the basis for re-starting economic growth, which would have been hindered by a protracted electoral process, and the pervasive COVID-19 pandemic.

The government’s total budget for road programmes is $23.7 billion, $7.9 billion of which will go specifically towards the development of community roads. Of the budgeted sum, $2.1 billion has been set aside for hinterland roads, and the rehabilitation of a number of hinterland airstrips.