Power outage continues to hurt Essequibo businesses with a complete shutdown of the network on Wednesday despite a Guyana Power and Light statement saying that power supply is back to near normalcy.
Small businesses which cannot afford a generator as yet were busy searching for ice to cool their items.
Poultry farmers said they are now forced to sell “live” chicken since they cannot say whether there will be a daily power supply.
One poultry farmer, Jean Samaroo said she is losing on her chickens since she cannot pluck them due to frequent power outages.
Samaroo related that she earns more from plucked chicken but due to the unreliable power supply, plucking is a risk. Many offices on Wednesday were unable to function due to the blackout.
Sanjay Persaud, a fisherman from Cotton Field, said he has not gone out to fish, owing to the unreliable power supply which hit the Essequibo Coast since last week.
He said GPL is unreliable and even if he purchases a generator, he cannot go to sea. Persaud sells fish in large quantities and if the power is unreliable, his customers would not buy fish since they would have to incur additional expenses to buy ice.
Meanwhile, GPL in a press release said all remedial work on the 11kV bus bar at the Anna Regina generating station has been completed and power supply has returned to a state of near normalcy.
According to the company, intermittent outages are, however, still being experienced as faults develop on its distribution network as a result of high winds.
“Be assured that no effort is being spared to deal with this situation. We apologise for the inconvenience caused, thank you for your forbearance over the past week and a half and we appeal for your patience over the next few days as we work towards ensuring that you have a Christmas that is free of outages. We also urge you to limit your use of electricity during the holiday season and to visit our website at www.gplinc. com for more information on energy conservation.”
