THE Government of Guyana, through the National COVID-19 Taskforce (NCTF), is examining the provision of stimulus packages for the private sector, with special focus on small businesses, entrepreneurs and small producers.
A number of recommendations have come from the sector to the Ministry of Business which is now working on a final submission of recommendations to the minister of finance.
This was disclosed by Chairman of the National COVID-19 Taskforce (NCTF), Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo, on Thursday.
He explained that before the recommendations are submitted, they must first be discussed by the Council of Ministers chaired by President David Granger, in consultation with the Finance Ministry.
“There has been a raft of measures proposed,” he said. “Yes, we will be looking into stimulus packages for the private sector organisations. From the point of view of the government, I’m aware that concerns are more particular at this time for small businesses; people who are self-employed vending on the street and have small vending outlets. We’re concerned about small producers, tailors who have been making clothing.”
However, the NCTF chairman reminded that Guyana currently has no budget and no contingency fund to lean on due to its electoral impasse.
It is over one month since Guyanese took to the polls on March 2, to cast their ballots in the 2020 General and Regional Elections.
However, the country has not yet had its overall elections results declared and no new administration has been sworn in. The Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) is set to facilitate a national recount of votes cast — the final exercise Guyanese hope will bring conclusion to the matter.
Nagamootoo stated: “We need to resolve our political problems and we need to move on as a nation and as a government to deal with these very pressing matters of how to stimulate our economy; how to keep production going; how to keep jobs going. We need to address these very, very important issues.”
Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle earlier in April, Private Sector Commission (PSC) member, Ramesh Dookhoo, had noted that the PSC has made recommendations to the government that a stimulus package be put in place for citizens to ease the financial burden.
He said that while some businesses have been giving back during the time of the crisis, they will not be able to sustain this for long, and sooner or later reality will set in.
“Businesses cannot sustain doing that for too long, given the pressures and the drop in revenue. So those businesses that are really applying a humanitarian posture towards this is commendable but the reality will kick in sooner than later,” Dookhoo said.
To aid in data collection, the Ministries of Business and Finance had rolled out a survey at the beginning of April, for the private sector to determine the extent to which businesses have been impacted by COVID-19.
The survey will be used to shape informed economic policy considerations and members of the business community were asked to urgently fill out the questionnaire, by Saturday, April 11, 2020.
Source: https://issuu.com/guyanachroniclee-paper/docs/guyana_chronicle_epaper_04_24_2020