Why are we poor?

May 26, 2021 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Kaieteur News – People should listen more to Glenn Lall. His is not a rant about the wrongs, which have been committed against Guyana by foreign companies working in cahoots with our leaders.
Some of our leaders are seeking to project Glenn Lall as only raging against the oil industry. But anyone who has listened to his programmes will realise that what is being addressed is a more fundamental issue: Why should we be so poor when we have so much resources?
This is an issue, which has baffled persons from all walks of life and from all countries. There can hardly be a Guyanese who has not been asked the question how it is that the country and its people are so poor given that Guyana has so many resources – gold, timber, rice, sugar, bauxite and diamonds and its population is so small?
It is an utter disgrace that 55 years after Independence, Guyana earns less per capita than some of the smaller islands of the Caribbean. And Guyana’s per capita GDP is still almost one-third of what exists in Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago, despite the problems these countries have faced in recent times.
Many years ago, there was a Working Paper published by an international organisation, which sought to compare the post-Independence development of Guyana and Barbados. It was argued that what accounted for the difference in development was something called ‘factor productivity.’ Basically, the experts were saying that we were not getting enough out of our inputs. The imputation was that our labour was not efficient.
That theory has since been discredited. But the question remains unanswered: how it is that small Caribbean states have done much better than Guyana since Independence?
Glenn Lall has not set out to answer that question or to compare Guyana with other Caribbean states. He is not simply railing against the exploitation of Guyana by foreign multinationals. Obviously, he is upset by the betrayal of our leaders who have failed to get a good deal for the country, be it in the oil and gas sector or the gold industry. All he wants is a better deal for the country.
But indirectly, he is providing an explanation as to why the Guyanese people remain poor despite the country being rich in resources. He is suggesting that the problem is that the Guyanese people have been short-changed by their governments when it comes to the resources. He has for years now been saying that if the country had gotten a fair share when it comes to its resources, no Guyanese would need to work anymore.
So why are we poor? A lot of excuses have been provided in the past. In the 1970’s when the price of sugar soared and oil prices were low, Burnham used to taunt oil-rich Trinidad by telling Eric Williams that oil does not spoil but you cannot eat oil. He used to brag about the high prices he was receiving for sugar.
He recognised that the foreign multinationals were exploiting the country, reaping the rewards from our resources and shipping out our riches. And so he nationalised the sugar and bauxite industries in the hope that state-ownership would allow more money to remain in the country. But the US government sent an envoy to him and the man read to him the riot act and Burnham was forced to pay compensation for nationalisation. That compensation drove the country into deeper debt and contributed to the crashing of the economy.
From the mid 1970s, the economy began to ‘flat line.’ And the excuse was high oil prices. But guess what, all the other countries in the Caribbean had to contend with high oil prices and they did not have food shortages, extended power outages, retrenchment and devaluation.
And so Guyana moved from one extreme to the next; from foreign exploitation to state incompetence. The result was that Guyana remained poor while the rest of the Caribbean, with far less resources, surpassed us.
The tragedy of Guyana today is far worse. The foreign exploiters have returned. And they are devouring our resources and paying us a pittance, just like in the days of Bookers, ALCAN and Reynolds. Only today, the players are different and they are operating in the bauxite, gold mining, oil and gas sector.
Why is Guyana poor given all the resources that it has? Listen to Glenn Lall and how he exposes how Guyana is being taken to the “cleaners” by foreign multinationals while our leaders turn a blind eye.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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