Guyana is the new Qatar, poised to become a ‘juggernaut’ in the global energy circle, given the discoveries of voluminous deposits of hydrocarbons offshore the South American nation. This is according to Americas Market Intelligence’s (AMI) Senior Director, Remi Piet, who in a recent interview with Investing News Network (INN), posits that with the discoveries by ExxonMobil, “this country is going to go from under development to an extreme level of [positive] economic growth.”
Piet was at the time speaking to the imminent commercial production of oil by ExxonMobil saying, by “2020, 2021, we are going to see a political regime being able to re-invest very large amounts of royalties and taxation from production of oil in the country.”
Piet, who is also Co-founder of AMI’s Natural Resources and Infrastructure Practice, said, “clearly in terms of the energy circle, Guyana is the new Qatar, the new country that actually, out of almost very little development, will become a juggernaut in the energy geo-politics.”
However, the AMI Senior Director said gaps exist, such as the lack of capacity, and pointed out that the existing political instability in the country – a result of imminent Regional and General Elections triggered by a no confidence vote – is a matter of concern.
He observed that the scale of commercial production in Guyana, coupled with the level of revenues to be injected in the economy was, “not foreseen and domestic institutions are not ready for such a big change in terms of the development of its economic path.”
This, he surmises “obviously triggers a lot of appetite both at the political level and at the economic level with the upcoming elections and who will be at the helm of the country and therefore decide on the type of regulations to be put in place.”
The discovery of very large oil reserves, he asserts nonetheless, “changed completely the structure of the future economy of the country; a country which is probably one of the least developed in the Western Hemisphere.”
