With Guyana’s accelerated oil sector production creating labour shortages across various sectors, authorities revealed plans to develop an integrated labour market information system.
Senior Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh noted on Monday during the unveiling of the 2024 budget that this system is intended to ameliorate the mismatch between available jobs and persons seeking employment. Minister Singh said, “As we aim to build out the non-oil sector of our economy, the resilience and professional work ethic of our labour force will be crucial to achieving a dynamic and sustainable development path.”
Furthermore, Minister Singh said government will also continue to monitor the labour market dynamics in the economy to ensure its interventions are appropriate.
The economist said the foregoing measure is intended to build upon initiatives undertaken in 2023 to address labour market pressures.
He said these initiatives included expanding opportunities for the working population to be trained in employment ready jobs. He said this was evident with investments in the world class Guyana Technical Training College (GTTC), the Hospitality Institute and specialised offerings made available through the Guyana Academy of Learning (GOAL) scholarship programme.
Minister Singh also noted the hosting of targeted job fairs in several regions to sensitise and recruit available skills from communities, particularly outside of Georgetown. He said this initiative has shown great success in 2023 and will be aggressively pursued in 2024.
