The Guyana economy grew by 14.5% during the first six months of 2021, according to the mid-year report released by the Ministry of Finance.

The Ministry of Finance said the favourable economic performance at the end of the first half of 2021 in the non-oil economy bodes well for the upcoming second half of 2021 and into the future.

Senior Minister of Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh is expected to table the report at the first sitting of the National Assembly, when legislators return from their annual recess.

According to the report, the agriculture, forestry and fishing industries sectors contracted by 2.4%, mining and quarrying grew by 23.1%, manufacturing expanded by 13.1%, the construction sector increased by 25.5% while services expanded in the first half of this year by 9.4%.

The report also noted that foreign direct investment in the first half of 2021 was 41.6% higher than the US$940.6 million recorded in 2020 for the same period. Consumer prices at the end of June 2021 grew by 5.6%, largely driven by increased food prices.

Rapid transformation of certain sectors

This is primarily attributable to inclement weather.  Earlier this year, Singh had indicated that Guyana would be one of the fastest-growing economies in terms of real gross domestic product (GDP) predicting a rapid transformation in a number of sectors give that the government was making efforts to boost the non-oil sector.

The report noted that the rice industry grew by an estimated 7.8 per cent in the first half of the year, marginally lower than the target set for the period, ‘other crops’ declined by 7.3 per cent due to the floods and the livestock industry was estimated to have grown by 10.6 per cent when compared to the same period in 2020.

However, for that same period, the fishing industry contracted by an estimated 6.6 per cent and the forestry industry by 7.1 per cent. The total output from the petroleum sector increased by 65.4 per cent when compared to the same period last year.

Diamond, sand and stone grew by an average of 63.3 per cent with quarry stone having a growth output of 141 per cent, sand declarations growing by 119.3 per cent as a result of increased activity in the construction sector, while diamond declarations improved with a growth of 166.3 per cent. The outlook for the remainder of this year for other mining industries was estimated to be promising as well with an estimated growth rate of 74.5 per cent for the entire year.