POSITIONS FROM THE PRESIDENT ‘New World Coalition’ could bring balance on issues affecting developing countries – Ali

President Dr Irfaan Ali has stressed that now is an opportune time for a “new world coalition” to bring balance to the international debate around the issue of climate change, food security, and energy security.

The Head of State, who delivered the feature address at the opening of the International Energy Conference and Expo Guyana 2023 at the Marriott Hotel Tuesday, spoke of the inequalities that hinder the growth of developing nations and the double standards that exist.

These challenges, the President stressed, should not be confronted in isolation. He said, “How can we lead a new world effort in building a coalition that addresses these three challenges that the world we live in will face, is facing, and will face in a more severe manner?”

He urged the audience to consider the realistic positioning of issues as it relates to global CO2 emissions, based on data which shows that South America, Central America and the Caribbean combined, account for just 3.6% of emissions. He said, “Why aren’t the headlines about the ten largest economies that account for 62.7% of CO2? Why suddenly the 3.6% bears the brunt of the headline? But we have in our societies, and in our region, people who consider themselves self-righteous, but do not base their argument on the facts and the circumstances, but they appeal to the emotive being of people.”

The Head of State underscored the importance of developing countries putting systems in place to ensure that they can continue to progress under changing circumstances.

As a Region, the President said there should be a collective approach to overall development.

He highlighted the drive of CARICOM and its food security measure, which Guyana is spearheading, while he also spoke of oth- er regional opportunities, including the longevity of electricity from natural gas in Guyana, Trinidad and Suriname and the energy corridor between Guyana, Roraima (Brazil) and Suriname.

Low Carbon Development Strategy

Although the country is an oil-producing nation, President Ali reminded that systems are still in place to decarbonise in the future.

He said Guyana demonstrated global leadership on how natural resources can be sustainably harnessed more than a decade ago. He cited the country’s Low Carbon Development Strategy 2030, as a main action in its “development platform”, while explaining about how it was enhanced to ensure that Guyana stays “true to morals and principles when it comes to the issue of climate change”. He said, “The LCDS is no longer a Guyana document. We are embarking on a mission to make the LCDS a global model for sustainable development because we know what LCDS is capable of.”

He also spoke about the country’s drive to protect its forest and to play its part to not only achieve net zero but being carbon negative.

The President reminded that oil and gas is geared to help the country develop its other sectors. Ali said, “We’ve consistently said oil and gas is not the answer. What it does is give us much-needed revenue to catalyse the other sectors, to incentivise the other sectors to make them competitive globally, to create a framework that will allow these sectors to grow and expand and to contribute to national development. That is what it does for us.”

The focus of the next seven years, he added, will be placed on building a country that has the competitive characteristics and the broadness in scope to be viable, resilient and sustainable in a world 2030 and beyond. Oil and gas and proper policies have ensured that Guyana has an investment portfolio that spans many partners, including the US, UK, China, India and a number of other countries. Ali said, “All of them are part of financing transformative projects in Guyana. The investors’ confidence in the country is very high, and it’s high because there is the predictability of policy. It is high because there’s a clear

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Govt’s policy direction has revolutionised Guyana’s housing sector – President Ali

ThePPP/C Government has crafted and implemented a “very deliberate, well-structured, well-positioned, well-articulated, well-researched policy” on forestry, housing and construction with the aim of enhancing the lives of Guyanese, according to President Dr. Irfaan Ali.

He said that this policy has seen our forestry “as a true national asset earning carbon credits, earning from the wood product itself, earning from ecotourism, and now we are moving to more scientific areas of biodiversity and pharmaceutical values”.

The Head of State made this assertion during the recent launch of DuraVilla’s 1000+ modular homes initiative at the company’s Land of Canaan location.

He reminded the gathering that the forestry sector declined significantly from 2015 to 2020 under the previous administration, resulting in the loss of significant export earnings and employment.

The President noted that as a result of the policy decisions taken by his administration upon its return to Government, the sector was again ignited, re-energised and repositioned. This, he added, has led to an increase in production, an improvement in export and an increase in employment.

The President cited Barama’s success story and the company’s transformation from “a company that was

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