Min Edghill outlines opportunities in construction sector to Jamaican Trade Mission

Guyana’s construction industry is among the many non-oil sectors that are propelling the country’s economy.

On Tuesday, Minister of Public Works, Bishop Juan Edghill outlined a host of investment opportunities available in the construction sector to a visiting Jamaican Trade Mission.

During the breakfast engagement with 60 Jamaican business personnel, led by Jamaica’s Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Senator Aubyn Hill, Minister Edghill said Guyana’s construction industry is transforming rapidly.

“In this next level of development, which we envisage will bring prosperity to all our people, we are doing very strategic and necessary things, not just for the present, but to build out for the future,” he told the delegation at the Guyana Marriott Hotel.

Among the major projects outlined by the minister was the construction of the Corentyne River Bridge which will link Guyana and Suriname.

“The intent is to make that island a tax-free zone that will attract different kinds of businesses. Once we get that bridge in place, it will be opening up a great route of traffic that could move all the way…Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana into Brazil at one end,” he explained.

He relayed thatconstruction will begin this year on the new four-lane concrete Demerara River Bridge which will bring more economic activities to Georgetown and the West Bank of Demerara.

Also, the contract for the construction of a 600-metre bridge in Region 10 linking Wismar to Linden will soon be out.

“We are open for proposals and discussions. If you would like to finance and build, the possibility exists there,” Minister Edghill highlighted.

The Linden to Lethem Road Link is being developed and 45 bridges are under construction along this stretch. This road will eventually form the Guyana to Brazil road link that will be linked to a deep-water harbour in the Berbice River at Palmyra, Region Six.

“The same journey that can take 11 days, using Guyana’s deep-water harbour, you can get your supplies out in 72 hours.”

A stadium is also being developed, as well as housing areas, and a municipal airport in the Berbice area. “You would realise that there is a greater need for supplies to satisfy these contractual obligations,” Minister Edghill pointed out.

These and several other transformational projects are underway.