As the fastest-growing economy in the world this decade, thanks to the pumping of its newfound oil reserves, Guyana is attracting worldwide attention from businesses large and small, in neighboring nations and countries far away.
That enthusiasm shone this month, when more than 150 people from Guyana, Caribbean islands, Brazil, the US, Europe and beyond gathered for the World Trade Centre Georgetown’s international trade and investment conference, the second such annual conclave organized by the business-support group that launched in October 2025.
Sessions focused on opportunities not only in Guyana’s booming oil and gas sector but also in its non-oil areas, from expanding banking and insurance ties to building regional transport links and boosting agriculture and manufacturing for export. Panels also looked at broader business issues from the new geopolitical landscape for trade, prospects for Artificial Intelligence, how to do business with Brazil, how to export to the US, and more.
“The world connects to Guyana today through this conference,” CEO of Guyana’s investment agency GO-Invest, Peter Ramsaroop, told the opening session of the Oct.19-23 meeting. He laid out the government’s ambitious plans, from expanding food production and agro-industry, to facilitating a multi-billion-dollar deepwater port, growing tourism and ushering prosperity to all in Guyana. “The government is here to enable you to make money,” he told attendees in such diverse fields as tech, trade law and customer service.
Organizers said the conference aimed to spur international partnerships, such as the Brazilian group now starting to import Guyana’s Diamond-brand bottled water and US-European group Galiark looking to apply its AI platform to trade finance for small businesses in the Caribbean region. The WTC-Georgetown is compiling recommendations from the event for local and regional authorities on ways to reduce bottlenecks to trade and investment and accelerate business across borders, said Executive Director Wesley Kirton.
“Collaboration is not merely a nice idea. It’s an economic necessity,” Kirton told the conference, noting countries can’t meet wide-ranging needs alone in today’s fast-changing, interconnected and sometimes uncertain world.
Among specific projects and recommendations discussed at the conference:
-Deepwater port. With shallow waters making it impossible to bring in the world’s biggest ships into Guyana, keeping freight costs high, a deepwater port is seen as a game changer for Guyana’s future. A feasibility study is now underway to look at potential throughput, cashflow and other basics, so the multi-billion-dollar project can be financed, said Jamie McInerney who runs Caribbean advisory services for the US-based firm Cross Boundary.
A deepwater port should be developed in an integrated way, so Guyanese producers can send goods overland from farms to the port easily; manufacturers can produce in free-trade zones by the port to export quickly; and energy can be supplied in a cost-effective way, said David Fernandes, managing director of Guyana’s Bounty Farm Ltd., the country’s largest poultry producer now diversifying into wheat, corn and soy production.
-Highway to Brazil. As work continues to upgrade the lengthy road between Guyana and Brazil into a highway, Guyana has the potential to become a transshipment point for northern Brazil, not just for border areas but into Amazonas state and its capital Manaus. That’s because Brazil is so big that suppliers in the Brazil’s south are sometimes as far or farther from Amazonas than Guyana is, said Juarez Baldoino, CEO of Brazil’s Balponte Business Intelligence, which publishes a business magazine in Manaus.
The Brasil-Guyana Chamber of Commerce is helping companies in both neighboring countries to expand trade and recently assisted a Guyana mission to Manaus, said Chamber executive Georgia Rodrigues, calling some families spanning both sides of the border “brothers.”
-Skills building. Of course, working internationally means meeting different requirements and standards, some new for businesses. Miami trade lawyer Jennifer Diaz reminded those seeking to sell food products to the US to get their labeling and invoicing right, especially since the current US administration is keener on trade enforcement these days. As the future portends more computerization and AI, Guyana and other nations also need to boost technical training, including courses to certify Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) technicians, said Komal Samaroo, chairman of the WTC-Georgetown.
-Caribbean Community (Caricom) links. Guyana’s fast growth offers extra opportunities for fellow, small countries in Caricom, which share special trade benefits. The conference highlighted links and potential with two member states: Belize and St. Kitts-Nevis.
With Guyana developing its deepwater port, Belize could become a hub for goods shipped from Guyana into Central America, Belizean leaders agreed. The eastern Caribbean nation of St. Kitts-Nevis already is gaining, as Guyana’s Demerara Distillers Ltd. expands into its tourism-based economy, said Candisie Franklin, a lawyer with the St. Kitts-Nevis government.
Guyana’s economy is forecast to grow by more than 20 percent this year and the non-oil sector by roughly 10 percent, spurring commerce. Opportunities are so great that some three dozen business owners and students from Caricom nations took part in an all-day workshop during the conference to learn the fundamentals of international trade research.
Said the Prime Minister of St. Kitts-Nevis in remarks sent to the World Trade Centre event: “Our collective success depends on our ability to connect.”
Guyana’s Natural Resources Minister Vickram Bharrat encouraged overseas firms to unite with his country’s private sector to develop business in Guyana. He said the government is proud that a 2021 law requiring local participation in the oil-and-gas industry has directly or indirectly benefited 1,200 Guyanese firms so far, supporting thousands of jobs.
“Partnership,” said Bharrat, “that’s the formula where we see the greatest success.”
Doreen Hemlock is an international business journalist who has lived in and worked in the Caribbean and Latin America for decades. She now lives and works in Miami. She led sessions at the World Trade Centre-Georgetown conference on the global business environment and on boosting trade within Latin America and the Caribbean.
