— as works on Berbice deep-water port move apace; bridge linking access road to site commissioned

WITH the ongoing construction of the Berbice Deep Water Port, at the mouth of the Berbice River by CGX Energy Inc and its subsidiary, Grand Canal Industrial Estates Inc, President Dr Irfaan Ali, on Friday, commissioned the bridge linking the access road to the site.
The bridge is located at Seawell Village, East Berbice, Region Six.

The pre-stressed reinforced concrete bridge and access road which costs approximately US$1M is a small step in the first phase of the port with a budget of US$80M. The overall construction will see an investment of more than US$200M being injected into the project.

“The bridge is not crossing a major waterway but it is significant, it is a major step towards the development of the deepwater port here in Berbice. And that port will play an important role in Guyana’s oil and gas industry as well as the product exportation,” Canadian Ambassador to Guyana, Mark Berman, said.

Following the ribbon-cutting ceremony, the President, Dr Irfaan Ali; Senior Minister within the Office of The President with Responsibility for Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh; Minister within the Ministry of Public Works, Deodat Indar; the Canadian ambassador, other government officials and members of the private sector toured the site where the wharf is under construction.

During the construction stage, the project is expected to provide employment for more than a 1,000 persons said Minister Singh, who reiterated that it was initiated several years ago and its completion will bring tremendous benefit to Guyana.

UNFOLDING VISION
“This bridge represents the latest installment in the unfolding of a vision for Berbice and a vision for Guyana, the foundation of which were being laid several years prior to today. Construction of the port will see no less than 1,000 jobs created. We are assured by the company that in operation, the port will create no less than 350 jobs — that again will be taken up by sons and daughters of Region Six. We want this to happen and we want this to happen in a hurry,” the minister said.

He added: “This represents a tangible and demonstrable step towards Berbice, Regions Five and Six playing an active, meaningful and compelling role in Guyana’s oil and gas industry. This port will service the operators in the Corentyne Block and perhaps operators elsewhere and ultimately service industries beyond the oil and gas sector. This represents a direct investment of more than US$200M in Region Six and so it represents a very significant investment that did not happen by accident, but rather an investment that is being realised by a vision for Region Six and a vision for Guyana.”

DIRECT BENEFIT
Meanwhile, President Ali stated that apart from the job opportunities, the investment will see consumers benefitting directly from reduced logistics costs.

“Not only is this an infrastructural investment at the highest scale of service delivery but importantly this investment here can see containerised traffic, direct export of grains, immediately reduces the cost of transport logistics which ultimately would bring direct benefit to the consumer.”
The government, he said, is committed to supporting and creating an environment that will facilitate growth and development of Guyana.

“So if we have a deepwater harbour in Region Six that is linked to Suriname and linked to other opportunities, the infrastructure must be in place to take of this. We must have wider roads, we must have better highways and what most people do not understand is that Region Six has the important catalytical push to bring what we call trans-border development.”

CGX Chairman, Suresh Narine, said the project is on budget and schedule with the first phase on track for completion by October 2022.
“We expect to have the oil and gas supply base ready between August to October 2022 and fully operational. We are on schedule and on budget. We will have the rest of the facility built to handle agriculture import and export — that will be ready in 2023.

This part of the facility will be for the total expenditure of US$80M and then we have earmarked another 30 acres for development following that,” he said.