Gold price increase on World Market could benefit Guyana

Georgetown, GINA- June 28, 2016

The increase in gold prices on the international market could help Guyana surpass its targeted production. The increase follows the UK’s vote to leave the European Union (EU) last Friday.

Minister of Natural Resources, Raphael Trotman, told the Government Information Agency (GINA) in an invited comment that, “We’re happy that our (gold) prices have increased.”

However, Trotman added, “We’re not happy that our increases comes really on the back of a broken system elsewhere.” Gold is now trading at just over US$1300 per ounce on the international market.

This increase on the international market is likely to help Guyana surpass its targeted production and declaration in gold locally. Guyana’s budgeted target for gold production this year is 550,000 ounces.

“I don’t want to reveal what is our target internally but we’re working on a target that goes past 550,000 ounces. So I would say that we’re doing relatively well in the circumstances,” Trotman noted. He added that he would like to see production declaration surpass 600,000.

Additionally, Trotman told GINA that as a “citizen of the world,” the situation in Europe concerns us all. “Stability is what the world wants so anything that disrupts the national or global order is something that we should all be concerned about,” Trotman said.

“In as much as we’re happy for the increase in gold prices, very happy, we also would like to see stability and normalcy in all parts of the world including Europe,” the Minister of Natural Resources added.