Stakeholders involved in the Conservancy Adaptation Project (CAP) met last Saturday to discuss the results and future investments for the 2008-2013 project.
The project results include enhanced government’s knowledge and capacity to manage the East Demerara Water Conservancy (EDWC) and the coastal drainage systems as well as a US$123 million package of investments critical for flood management.
Agriculture Minister, Dr Leslie Ramsammy in his remarks to the gathering at the Regency Hotel, Hadfield Street, Georgetown, noted the importance of the project since Guyana’s development, he said, is largely dependent on, and is driven by agriculture.
“If we are to look at it this way, we should look back at the 2005 flood when we saw how people’s lives were disrupted and livelihood were threatened, and we also saw how agriculture and therefore the overall development of our country was affected.”
Minister Ramsammy alluded to the fact that because of the 2005 flood, more than 60 per cent of Guyana’s Gross Domestic Product was affected. To this end, he noted that Guyana must as a priority now focus on infrastructural advancement for sustaining its developmental path, but importantly for accelerating that path.
Achievable
“Guyana has ambitions to be a high middle income country. I remember a long time ago in 1991 listening to Dr Jagan as he outlined his own vision for Guyana that it is not impossible for Guyana to become a developed country, and that within the lifetime, we can in fact emerge as a high middle income country.”
Today, the Minster said, Guyana is well on its way to reaching that ambition, but reiterated that the development of the country’s infrastructure is critical in the pursuit of that ambition; hence, the CAP is a good example of ensuring continued development.
The Agriculture Minister also pointed out that the CAP also ties in well with the Ministry’s 2013-2020 Strategic Plan that will include components to build capacity for the use of technologically advanced equipment and methods for flood control management.
Another component of the Ministry’s 2013-2020 Strategic Plan will include modelling the prediction of flood, which is an important area for developing agriculture, and developing the infrastructure of Guyana.
Minister Ramsammy said it is his hope that all these components can be achieved as they will all aid in taking the country into a different direction to accelerate development.
