Despite Guyana’s growing acclaim for its significant oil and gas resources, Head of State, Dr. Mohammed Irfaan Ali remains determined to not let the nation’s longstanding agriculture sector fall by the wayside. The President recently reminded of his government’s interest in expanding the livestock industry in quality and quantity as he noted his pursuit of Halal certification.
Towards this end, he said that a meeting was held with Dr. Yousef Al-Othaimeen, Secretary-General of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) where he discussed the completion of an updated country strategy that is reflective of the new Government’s agenda in the context of the Islamic Development Bank’s support in realizing projects and programmes of the country.
“I also outlined Guyana’s interest in expanding its livestock and poultry production in keeping with the Halal industry specifications and offered to host and OIC headquarters in the region. Now, the Halal industry certification is important for us as we work on expanding our livestock industry and our poultry industry,” expressed the President.
He said this is a niche market that has tremendous potential for local producers. “As you’re aware we are working aggressively on a programme to reduce the input costs to reduce the cost of production, increase our efficiency, and improve and increase our production to become large scale producers and suppliers of livestock, and poultry products and supplies,” the President concluded on this matter.
It was last month that this news agency reported on the significant investments made this year by the government to boost the growth of the livestock industry. For the first half of 2021, Guyana Standard reported the Agriculture Ministry spent $407.2 million on the development of the Livestock industry with a total of $399m still left on its budget for expenditure before year-end. This was noted by the Ministry of Finance in its latest economic report.
The Ministry said the livestock industry is estimated to have grown by 10.6 percent when compared with the first half of 2020. It said growth was observed in the production of poultry meat, mutton, beef, pork, and table eggs, while the production of milk fell by 15.2 percent when compared with the same period last year. Guyana Standard understands that the higher poultry meat production was the result of an increase in the importation of hatching eggs, along with several small producers re-entering the industry to capitalise on higher prices.
The industry is now projected to grow by 6.4 percent in 2021, reflecting primarily an upward adjustment to the forecast for poultry meat production.
