GO-Invest will be sole investment agency in Guyana – CEO

– in talks with Govt. on development of new investment model

July 17, 2015 | By KNews | Filed Under News, Source

As the new administration works out just how it will deal with the government agency GO-Invest, it appears that the body will be the only one to deal with the country’s investments.

This is according to Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of GO-Invest, Keith Burrowes, who made the announcement during a meeting with members of the Private Sector Commission (PSC) on Monday.

During a round of questioning with the media, Burrowes indicated that he had met with new Minister of Business and Investment, Dominic Gaskin.

During the meeting, he said, Gaskin had shared the Government’s expectations of GO-Invest. He said too that there are changes that are already being planned.

One of these changes, Burrowes said, was making GO-Invest the sole investment agency in Guyana.

“One of those changes is that GO-Invest is expected to become the only organisation or agency dealing with investment,” Burrowes said. He added that Minister Gaskin will expand upon this new initiative.

“The last discussion I’ve had with Minister [Gaskin], he had indicated that it should be before the third quarter,” he added.

Burrowes further said that, if the decision is formalized, it would place a lot of pressure on GO-Invest. However, he said, he has no problem with any such arrangement.

According to Burrowes, the agency is already undergoing “revamping”. This revamping had been ongoing even before the new Government had been instituted, he clarified.

Meanwhile, Burrowes indicated that GO-Invest is looking at several models of investment to implement in the agency. He said that discussions will eventually take place with the PSC before any such model is adopted. He emphasised that the model will be different from others which currently exist and will be created with Guyana’s specific needs in mind.

He further outlined specific areas which will be under review as GO-Invest moves forward with a new investment model.

“The two main areas that we will be focusing a lot on is our monitoring of these concessions that are usually given to private sector entities. We are going to be monitoring them on an ongoing basis to ensure that the concessions are used for the reason that it was established for,” he explained.

The other area, he continued, would be the establishment of a partnership between the public and private sectors.

“We’re hoping that even in terms of the investors coming in, that’s something we’ll want to look at to see if we can have not only the concessions given to the investors, but have a more long-term public/private partnership,” Burrowes said.

He emphasised that once all of the proposals are formally approved by the Government they will be made public.

Meanwhile, Burrowes also indicated that the establishment of a database which would capture all of the investments coming into Guyana, regardless of which agency it was tied to, had also been put forward to Minister Gaskin. Further, he said, while this proposal had been previously approved it was never implemented. He said that once the decision approval comes from Gaskin, this database can begin almost immediately.

“My engagement with the current Minister has been extremely fruitful; I believe that the sector is in very good hands now,” Burrowes said.

On previous occasions, Burrowes had indicated that GO-Invest only handled a limited number of the investments coming into Guyana. During Monday’s session, he once more reiterated this, and said that the investments which GO-Invest had previously handled had not been the crucial areas of investment.

With the new decision of GO-Invest being the sole investment agency, the body will have responsibility for sectors, such as the extractive industries, which had previously been handled by the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment.