With Guyana on the verge of a massive socio and economic transformation thanks to its budding Oil and Gas Industry, expert Guyanese residing in the diaspora should return home to assist the country in planning and executing a well-conceived national development plan, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said.
While US oil giant ExxonMobil has discovered more than 8 billion barrels of recoverable resource in the country’s Stabroek Block, CSIS said it would be naïve to assume that Guyana will be immune to the resource curse.
“Divisive politics, weak political institutions, persistent corruption and high levels of tension and latent conflict in the population mostly over ethnic divisions are a very quick indication of how Guyana could easily move in this direction. The problems surrounding the March 2, 2020 national election are a reminder of this reality,” CSIS said in its just released report ‘The Guyanese Diaspora.’
CSIS is a bipartisan, nonprofit policy research organization dedicated to advancing practical ideas to address the world’s greatest challenges.
The center said with nearly half the number of Guyanese residing in the Diaspora, it is believed that diaspora communities, in particular the experts can play a key role in building the country.
“What is clear is that significant human, social, and economic resources are present not only in Guyana but also in the formidable Guyanese diaspora. Although the local population in Guyana can provide a workforce and certain skills on the ground, the diaspora offers many of the specialized skills and expertise that could contribute to the successful management of the new oil and gas sector and consequent downstream industrial development,” it said.
CSIS stated that the return of Guyanese experts in many fields, including in the energy sector, resource development, industrial engineering, health sector management, education, accounting, and environmental management, could assist the country in the complex process of planning and executing a well-conceived national development plan. It was keen on noting that any such plan must include concrete public policy measures in the areas of development and governance, with specific attention being paid to avoiding the resource curse.
“Using the diverse expertise offered by the Guyanese diaspora does not necessarily need to involve attracting individuals from the diaspora back to the country permanently. Many will be reluctant to do so, at least at present, given the country’s high levels of insecurity, social divisions, corruption, inadequate health services, and political instability. However, new communications technology, short-term travel, and collaboration between international academic institutions and existing diaspora organizations could help create an initial path for the diaspora to share resources, skills, knowledge, and qualifications with locals,” CSIS reasoned.
It explained that offering opportunities to young and adult diaspora members through consultancies, temporary exchange programmes or contracting work, investment plans, and mentoring programmes can ease interested diaspora members into the new world of opportunities in Guyana.
CSIS estimates that there are approximately 550,000 first-generation immigrant Guyanese in the diaspora, with 80 per cent of them residing in North America, primarily in the U.S. It is estimated that over 400,000 people in the United States are Guyanese or of Guyanese ancestry.
In its menu of recommendations CSIS said that Guyana and its diaspora could collaborate through a “Guyana Global” initiative.
Given the global dispersion of the diaspora and the current landscape brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic, CSIS said the Guyana Global initiative should be based on a comprehensive digital strategy to harness the human capital within the Guyanese diaspora as a resource to be tapped in Guyana’s development.
It posited that a cloud-based “portal,” including an online “community/platform” of diaspora experts, could serve as a framework and a formal means of communication between Guyana and the diaspora community.
