–highlights disciplined management and strategic growth

PRESIDENT Dr Irfaan Ali has highlighted Guyana’s disciplined and strategic management of its burgeoning oil sector, emphasising that careful planning and responsible stewardship are turning the nation’s energy wealth into lasting national development.
Speaking on Friday evening at the Guyana Oil and Gas Energy Chamber’s Annual Awards Presentation Dinner at the Marriott Hotel, he announced that a far-reaching national economic expansion and infrastructure integration plan will soon be made public.

The President framed the upcoming strategy as a defining roadmap for the next half-decade, one he characterised as unparalleled in ambition and national impact.
“This journey that we are on is now getting fired up,” he told the audience of private-sector executives, policymakers, Cabinet members, diplomats, and industry leaders.
He promised that “in the coming days, I will open with great clarity the economic expansion, infrastructure integration and development projections for our country over the next five years.”
The announcement comes as Guyana moves deeper into a wave of historic investment, propelled largely by rapid developments in its energy, logistics, and industrial sectors.
The President pointed to Wales and Berbice as the country’s new strategic anchors—regions he said will form the nucleus of a modern, integrated national energy ecosystem.
At Wales on the West Bank of Demerara, he said more than US$4 billion is expected to flow into projects over the next five years, including the gas-to-energy initiative, power generation facilities, a fertiliser plant, fabrication operations, manufacturing and industrial zones, marine infrastructure, and gas bottling and logistics services.
In Berbice, he highlighted plans for a second gas project, the establishment of a deep-water port, expanded industrial activities, and a gas pipeline estimated at more than US$2 billion.
Together, these two regions are expected to push close to US$10 billion in fresh infrastructure and energy-linked development.
“That is remarkable by any standard,” President Ali said. “If that can’t excite you and excite us as a people, I don’t know what will.”
Dr Ali also underscored the scale of Guyana’s rapidly rising oil production. Output is expected to close the year at roughly 930,000 barrels of oil per day, up from 650,000 earlier this year, and projections place Guyana at a conservative 1.3 million barrels per day by 2030.
Yet he tempered this optimism with a note of caution, citing forecasts of an oversupply in global energy markets between 2025 and 2030.
“This industry is price-, cost-, technology-, politically-and regulatory-sensitive,” he stressed. “Every element of risk associated with doing business is associated with this industry. It is not an easy task to manage and balance those risks.”
But infrastructure and production alone will not determine the country’s success. President Ali placed heavy emphasis on human capital, insisting that the pace of transformation requires a workforce capable of matching its momentum.
“The greatest complaint in the private sector today is on human capital management. Businesses complain of being unable to find workers,” he said, urging Guyanese workers to pursue upskilling, increased productivity, and a mindset committed to high performance.
A workforce lacking in maturity or efficiency, he warned, can erode competitiveness and weaken national progress.
President Ali added, “We must understand that our human capital has to develop at the same pace the economy demands of it.”
The President acknowledged the sense of optimism surrounding Guyana’s extraordinary growth, but appealed for measured expectations and a long-term outlook.
President Ali said that Guyanese are living in a time described as Guyana’s golden era, a period in which the nation will be the envy of many and admired by the world.
“We cannot afford to be swept away by the tide of optimism,” he cautioned. “Our future is glorious, but we must remain disciplined, prudent and clear-eyed.”

Reiterating his administration’s priorities, President Ali said the government remains focused on converting oil revenues into durable national assets—infrastructure, human capital, energy security and a diversified economy capable of thriving long after the volatility of the market.
Fortunately, he emphasised that the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) administration has an unparalleled track record of managing national resources with strategic foresight, unmatched by any other political force in the country’s history.
“The Guyanese economy is not drifting; it is being guided, protected, and anchored by steady, competent hands. The economy is in safe hands—your hands, our hands, the nation’s hands—working together,” he declared.