More investment needed in sectors outside Oil & Gas – PSC official

Private sector official Deodat Indar has urged the authorities to create an environment to encourage more foreign direct investment in sectors other than the booming oil and gas industry.

Indar, who was recently elected Vice Chairman of the Private Sector Commission (PSC), is concerned that since 2014, foreign direct investments have been on a decrease.

With much focus being placed on the oil and gas sector in Guyana, the private sector official urged that more be done to attract investments in other areas of the country’s economy like infrastructure and security.

Government has already committed to using revenues from the oil and gas industry to diversify the economy.

But Indar believes that the foundation should be set now to attract foreign companies to other sectors of the country’s economy to ensure those industries develop at a similarly rapid rate.

Indar, who is also the President of the Georgetown Chambers of Commerce and Industry, lamented that Guyana imports more than it exports.

Citing statistics on the performance of the economy on the first quarter of 2018, he contended that the timber and logging sector should not account for merely 2.5% of the country’s total exports.

Likewise, with sugar and fruits and vegetables, which accounted for less than 2% of the total exports for the first quarter.