GCCI, GNBS sign MOU to improve standard of 20 small businesses

Twenty agro-processors across Guyana will soon benefit from a series of training from the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS) to improve their standards and certification.

This will be made possible through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which was signed between the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) and the GNBS on Thursday at GCCI’s Waterloo St, Georgetown office.

Forty micro, small, and medium-size businesses will be selected from each administrative region after which there will be inspections to look at their production capacity. Twenty beneficiaries will then be shortlisted to undergo training and other exercises to enhance their products.

They will be trained “in good manufacturing practices, Aesop certification, packaging and labelling.”

Executive Director of the GNBS, Candelle Walcott-Bostwick noted that improving the standards of local businesses is pertinent to pushing local companies to access export markets.

“If our local businesses are implementing those standards that are recognized globally, it shows that their products will be readily accepted and we can compete along any other company that is manufacturing a similar product on the global level,” Walcott-Bostwick said.

President of the GCCI, Deodat Indar said that a MoU will be signed with the Government Analyst Food and Drug Department to look at the enforcement of good practices.

The project is funded by the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB).