Finance Minister, Winston Jordan, confirmed today that Guyana’s economy reached an all-time high under the APNU+AFC administration, growing by 4.1 percent for 2018.
Describing the nation’s economic performance as “solid”, Minister Jordan said the sectors responsible for the “better than expected performance” were sugar, livestock, forestry gold, diamonds (mining), and the wholesale and retail trades.
The Finance Minister noted, “It is the first time under this government that we have crossed the threshold of 4 percent and I think it is a significant achievement for last year and will clearly put among the top performers in the Caribbean for last year.”
Last year’s growth came on the heels of a less than three percent GDP growth rate in 2017 and surpasses the projected performance of 3.4 percent in November of 2018. The latter was based on figures at hand and projections explained Minister Jordan. He recalled some of the challenges of the previous year such as the reforms implemented to stop the “hemorrhaging” of the sugar sector, in the quality of ore in the gold mining sector, fluctuating international prices, and poor-quality access roads.
The Minister noted that forestry, for example, gained as the government had allocated funds to rehabilitate many hinterland access roads. This, he said, enabled the forestry sector to benefit. The sector also gained from the move to redistribute lands, formerly controlled by the BaiShanLin Company to smaller operators who seized the opportunity to utilize the tracts of forests.
Moving forward, he stated that sectors such as sugar are expected to continue its stabilization and rebound, along with bauxite. The latter, Minister Jordan said should be on target despite the, now resolved labour, disputes.
It is projected that the GDP’s growth rate will be 4.4 percent in 2019. (Modified Reporting by DPI)
