Make 2019 air services agreement operational, Guyana public works minister tells Ghana delegation

The minister of public works in Guyana, Bishop Juan Edghill, has called on a Ghanaian delegation led by the Minister of Trade and Industry, K T Hammond, to take the necessary steps, as a matter of priority, to make the air services agreement signed between Ghana and Guyana in 2019 fully operational.

Bishop Edghill was addressing the Ghana delegation and guests at a ceremony to commission the Ghana Chamber of Commerce in Georgetown, Guyana officially on Monday (22 May 2023).

He said that, with the formal opening of the Ghana Chamber of Commerce in Guyana, bilateral relations between Guyana and Ghana have been made stronger, paving way for the full implementation of the four-year-old air services agreement.

“We signed an air services agreement with Ghana and it’s now up to the private sector, both here and in Ghana, to operationalise an airline, in keeping with those terms and conditions and freedoms,” said the public works minister, who also has responsibility for aviation.

Strategic chamber

Touching on the Ghana Chamber of Commerce in Guyana, which opened in Georgetown on Monday, Bishop Edghill expressed confidence that the chamber will allow the two countries to connect businesses and attract investment which will drive economic growth in Ghana and Guyana.

He added that the chamber, the first of its kind to be established in the Caribbean, will enable Guyana and Ghana to work together in many areas, including oil and gas, tourism, agriculture, education, sports and health.

Leaders hope that increasing co-operation between countries in Africa and the Caribbean will enable their peoples to spur rapid economic development and raise standards of living in both parts of the world.

New trade relations

Ghanas Trade and Industry Minister, Kobina Tahiru Hammond, said that the establishment of the Ghana Chamber of Commerce in Guyana has ushered the two countries into a new realm of trade relations where Ghana and Guyana will be able to sell their own, locally manufactured products to each other.

With a firm base in Guyana, Hammond said, businessmen and women from Ghana and Guyana can now sit, plan and focus on key areas of trade and investment interest.

It will be of mutual interest for the two countries to shore up the volumes of trade between them, he said.

“This is commerce, this is trade,” Hammond said. “We are talking about industrialisation; we are talking about the development of our respective countries. But you cannot produce, industrialise and keep all the products produced in your country.

“That is why I believe Ghana and Guyana have taken the right step through the opening of this chamber and the commitment to strengthen our bilateral relations,” the minister said.

Reporting by Wilberforce Asare