AMIDST the hustle and bustle ahead of the commencement of the new academic year, the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA), in collaboration with ExxonMobil Guyana, hosted Uncapped Marketplace and Food Festival on August 31 and September 1, 2024 at the Guyana National Stadium, Providence.

Uncapped Marketplace focuses on the outputs of Guyana’s agro-processing industry, with more than 100 agro-processors displaying their wide array of products at their booths.
The two-day event was perfect for a family outing, allowing attendees to celebrate local talent, incredible products, and delicious food.

The Guyana Chronicle was able to speak with a few of the exhibitors, who gladly shared their experience over the two-day activity.
Known widely for his coffee wines, entrepreneur John Luke from Luke’s Manufacturing, stated: “We recommend more and more ‘Uncapped’, because it’s about promoting and letting customers have a little more reasonable products, and natural products. So, recommend ‘Uncapped’ more.”

He mentioned that in addition to his popular coffee wines, Luke’s produces more than 21 items, made solely out of cassava. He said that when shopping from Luke’s, persons can purchase cassareep cubes and cassava seasonings for the various types of meats.

Products made by Luke’s Manufacturing can be purchased at the Guyana Shop in Georgetown, and for persons in Essequibo, they can be found on the shelves of Safeway Supermarket, and Gaulin Supermarket just to name a few.
Meanwhile, Mitford Ward, the owner of Wardy’s Agro-processing Establishment, said that Wardy’s has a number of interesting products, all of which are gluten free and mostly locally grown.
He further said that Wardy’s produces a variety of flours made from all ground-provisions, in addition to corn and moringa powder.

Loaded with several health benefits, Ward mentioned that the moringa powder is one of his best-selling products. “It’s one of the best things lowering your blood sugar if you’re diabetic. You can rely on moringa and you could forget about the Metformin and all the other drugs the doctor would give you, and you just use moringa powder; it controls your blood sugar,” he said.

Additionally, it was said that the product is very nutritious and recommended for the entire family. It supports memory, and contains more than 90 of over 100 minerals that are beneficial to the body.
His products are available for at the Guyana Shop, and at the Cacique Minimart in Station Street, Kitty, Georgetown.

Although he anticipated a bigger crowd, Ward expressed, “I’ve been attending Uncapped for several years now, and I can recall the very first Uncapped. I was here [and] the attendance was really wonderful. It was really encouraging to come.”

A fellow agro-processor, Sharmonica Garraway, the owner of Cocolight also spoke. Located at Lot 25 BB Eccles, East Bank Demerara, Cocolight produces virgin coconut oil, honey, crab oil, cassava cassareep, hot pepper sauce, sea moss, cassava bread and a number of other products.

Garraway expressed, “Of course, this has been a very good experience for me to come and display these products at Uncapped, and I would like to thank the presenters for holding this event and it has been a wonderful experience for us here at Cocolight,”
She said that in addition to their location in Eccles, persons can make purchases at their location at Stabroek and Bourda Markets in Georgetown.

With her rich blends of natural herbs and spices, Treeva Mounter, owner of Treev’s Natural Blends, produces rich diverse seasoning products. This includes fish seasoning, green seasoning, garlic sauces, bamboo fire pepper sauce and their grill meat rub. Treev’s is located at Tuschen on the East Bank Essequibo.

Mounter said: “We produce all of our products with natural ingredients, all locally produced. Our products can be used for every day cooking, especially our grill meat rub. It’s used for pot roasting, baking or even air frying; and we have our garlic sauces that can be used in curries,”
She remarked that this is her first year at Uncapped and it was a great experience.

According to Mounter, the support received from both vendors and customers was very good.
Treev’s Natural Blends can be found on the shelves of Survival Supermarket on Sheriff Street, Coss Cutters Supermarket and FreshCo Supermarket on the East Bank of Demerara, among other locations.