According to the latest report of Central Bank, Guyana’s earnings for exports last year increased by 13.8 percent or US$189.9 million to US$1,567.0 million. A compilation of the statistics shows that receipts from rice, “other exports”, gold, sugar and timber increased by 19.7 percent, 18.4 percent 14.3 percent, 2.5 percent and 1.1 percent respectively. However, there were lower receipts from bauxite which decreased by 0.9 percent.
With respect to sugar export earnings, this amounted to US$27.8 million, 2.5 percent more than the 2018 earnings. This outturn was attributed to a 0.4 percent increase in the volume of sugar exported. Additionally, the volume of sugar exported amounted to 78,071 metric tonnes or 275 metric tonnes more than the level exported in 2018. As a percent of total sugar exports, it was noted that the European Union (EU) under the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP) Sugar Protocol accounted for 55.5 percent compared with the 47.9 percent in 2018, while the CARICOM region accounted for 18.6 percent compared with 29.3 percent at end-2018.
As for rice export earnings, this amounted to US$222.7 million, 19.7 percent above the 2018 level. Central Bank noted that this outturn resulted from higher export volume and higher average export price. The volume of rice exported amounted to 526,617 metric tonnes, 12.0 percent or 56,305 metric tonnes more than the 470,312 metric tonnes exported in 2018. The Guyana Standard understands that the EU’s share of rice exports increased to 34.1 percent from 28.0 percent in 2018, while CARICOM’s share fell to 15.8 percent from 21.9 percent in 2018. Latin America’s share was 48.7 percent compared with 34.6 percent in 2018 due to the declining Venezuela market. The US market accounted for 1.4 percent of total rice exported.
The average export price of rice increased by 6.9 percent or US$27.3 to US$422.9 per metric tonne compared with US$395.6 per metric tonne in 2018.
