We should consider a policy to grant free land to all youth

May 11, 2009 Letters

Dear Editor,

Peeping Tom’s column of Saturday 2 May 2009 titled “Whatever happened to the plan for secondary towns in Guyana” caught my eye.

It raised a very relevant point about the creation of new towns.

Correctly he/she says that “It is economic activity that will define what constitutes a town and not just the infrastructure…..”

It is now apparent that construction of the 300-mile road to Brazil will be delayed as a result of the global financial crisis and a reduction in IFI (International Financial Institution) monies available for infrastructural work in this country. This may not altogether be a bad thing.

At the margins it means that government has been given more time to consider and study all aspects of the highway to Brazil as well as collateral development possibilities along this road which will link Lethem to Linden to Georgetown and in so doing link Guyana to South America’s economic powerhouse.

This North/South axis will open up the heartland of Guyana and will create a corridor of opportunity for Guyanese and of course Brazilians.

No doubt in 10-15 years Guyana will have such a paved super highway to the South. We must ensure that our youth in particular benefit from this opening up of our country.

It is hard to imagine 300 miles of new road traversing Guyana’s hinterland without several new towns being created along the route.

Based on existing population clusters I envisage new townships at places like Rockstone, Mabura, Arisaru Mountain, Kurupukari, Good Hope with the expansion of Linden and Lethem into larger population centres.

This township development is inevitable and it is important that studies be carried out early to determine the economic viability of potential new town sites and the extent to which they can sustain anticipated population growth.

These potential new towns should have a range of resources that can be developed profitably without exhausting the proximate resources. In other words the land utilised to create a new town must be designed to ensure that the natural basis of living is sustained in the long term.

Agriculture, cattle rearing, eco-tourism, mining, aquaculture and sustainable forestry are distinct possibilities.

Detailed economic plans then need to be prepared for each potential new township area scoping out the most suitable geographical locations able to support economic activities that will sustain whole townships. Our indigenous communities must be fully involved in these exercises as knowledgeable beneficiaries.

Focus should be placed not just on the extractive possibilities but also on the opportunities for downstream/value-added production and export.

Once this special economic viability study is done it could be used to site the new towns advantageously. The need for a connecting railway now arises but I shall deal with this important transport infrastructure again in a separate letter.

When considering the development of Guyana’s new towns, attention should be paid to the distribution and ease of land acquisition.

It should be spread in such a way that socially and economically weak groups will participate in the process and become beneficiaries.

I am in favour of a programme to grant all youth between 18 and 30 or 35 around 5 acres of free land along the Guyana/Brazil corridor against a clear arrangement that transport for the land will only be given after an agreed period of beneficial use.

This decision should be made by a panel of stakeholders drawn from the particular township community and its environs and not centrally.

Prior to allocation of homestead lots land-clearing and the provision of basic social and economic infrastructure should be carried out in phases.

The mighty USA was opened up for development by a policy of creating large numbers of stakeholders in the shortest possible time and look at it now.

Guyana should not be shy in adopting a similarly aggressive approach to opening up its hinterland. Let’s make of our youth stakeholders, pioneers and homesteaders.

In so doing we may be giving them the best guarantee of a prosperous, happy and safe future.

F. Hamley Case