Who Is Studying Guyana?

Sep 13, 2026 Features / Columnists, News

(Kaieteur News) – Guyana is changing faster than at perhaps any other period in our modern history. Our economy is expanding, communities are growing, migration is reshaping the labour market, billions of dollars are being spent on infrastructure and new industries are emerging. Yet at precisely the moment when we most need to understand what is happening to us, I find myself asking a simple question: Who is studying Guyana?

Data and research are sometimes treated as academic concerns, but they are instruments of development, particularly in a developing country where resources remain limited and mistakes are expensive. Businesses need reliable information about population, income, consumption and skills to decide where to invest. Government needs even more. How many secondary-school places will Region Four require five years from now? Where should the next hospital be built? How many nurses, teachers, engineers and technicians will Guyana need in 2035? Which communities are growing fastest? Where is poverty declining? Which diseases are increasing, among whom and where? Without reliable data, planning becomes intuition with a budget attached.