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| Established | 1965 |
|---|---|
| Ownership | 100% state ownership [1] |
| Governor | Gobind Ganga |
| Central bank of | Guyana |
| Currency | Guyanese dollar |
| Reserves | 530 million USD [1] |
| Website | bankofguyana |
The Bank of Guyana (BoG) is the central bank of Guyana. It was established in 1965 in advance of the country's independence in 1966. 6°48′48″N58°09′55″W / 6.813438°N 58.165361°W Dr. Gobind Ganga has been the governor of BoG since December 2014. [2]
The Bank's logo is divided into four sections, representing the industries of rice (top left), timber (top right), shipbuilding (bottom left) and minerals (bottom right).
The Bank of Guyana was established by virtue of the Bank of Guyana Ordinance No. 23 of 1965. Actual operation commenced on October 16. 1965 – seven months before the country gained political independence. The early establishment of the Bank was promoted by an agreement of the British Government (acting for the still colonial members of the British Caribbean Currency Board (BCCB) and the Trinidad & Tobago Government), for the dissolution of the BCCB by mid-1967 and the cessation of issuance of currency after 1965. [3]
The Bank of Guyana Ordinance established the Central Bank as an ‘autonomous institution' with headquarters in the capital city of Georgetown.
Within the context of the economy policy of the Government, the Bank shall be guided in all its actions by the objectives of fostering monetary stability and promoting credit and exchange conditions conducive to the growth of the economy of Guyana.
Apart from specifying the administrative and management arrangements for the Bank, the Ordinance, inter alia, decreed the Bank to: [4]
In September 2019, the Bank of Guyana blocked Republic Bank Financial Holdings' purchase of Scotiabank's operations in Guyana. [5] In December 2019, the Bank of Guyana became the managing body of the country's first sovereign wealth fund. [6] Five months later, the fund received its first royalty payment of US$4.9 million from offshore oil production. [7] In October 2020, the Bank of Guyana chose to soften identification requirements by commercial banks for individual account holders to open and maintain accounts, admitting that the previous requirements were too strict. [8]
The Ordinance establishing the Bank was revised and became the Bank of Guyana Act. CAP:85:02. This Act was further revised in 1995, 1998 and latterly in 2004. The later revisions significantly enhanced the role and purpose of the Bank within the framework of Guyana's economic and financial system. Additionally, they imparted greater autonomy to the Bank in terms of its constitution, administration and operations.
The Bank commenced issuing the new national currency notes on November 15, 1965, to replace the BCCB notes, the issuance of which was expected to cease by December 31, 1965. However, national coins were not issued until the mid-1967. To date, the Bank has maintained De La Rue and the Royal Mint as suppliers of the nation's currency.
In 2012, the Bank of Guyana started to issue $5,000 bills, the highest denomination of the history of the bank. [9]
At its establishment, the Bank was housed in temporary premises in three locations. The Governor operated from an office assigned to him in the Parliament Building.
Office space was rented from the Colonial Life Insurance Company, High Street, Georgetown, to house the Research Department while the BCCB's office in the General Post Office Building, Georgetown, executed currency operations on behalf of the Bank.
The Bank began under the leadership of its first Governor, Dr. Horst Bockelman, who was seconded from the Deutsche Bundesbank, Germany. He was also involved in setting up the Central Bank in neighbouring Trinidad and Tobago. The Governor was later supported by Mr. Kemal Sogancilar, who was appointed Banking Manager. He was seconded from the Central Bank of Cyprus but served earlier in the Turkish Central Bank.
All of the other positions were initially held by Guyanese. Two years later, William P. D’Andrade acceded to the top position to become the first Guyanese Governor of the Bank. He was an ex-officio member of the Board of Directors as a result of his post of Secretary to the Treasury, Ministry of Finance and later served briefly as Deputy Governor.
The Eastern Caribbean dollar is the currency of all seven full members and one associate member of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS). The successor to the British West Indies dollar, it has existed since 1965, and it is normally abbreviated with the dollar sign $ or, alternatively, EC$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies. The EC$ is subdivided into 100 cents. It has been pegged to the United States dollar since 7 July 1976, at the exchange rate of US$1 = EC$2.70.
Georgetown is the capital and largest city of Guyana. It is situated in Demerara-Mahaica, region 4, on the Atlantic Ocean coast, at the mouth of the Demerara River. It is nicknamed the "Garden City of the Caribbean." It is the retail, administrative, and financial services centre of the country, and the city accounts for a large portion of Guyana's GDP. The city recorded a population of 118,363 in the 2012 census.
The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) is a supranational central bank that serves Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, all members of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) that use the ECCB-issued Eastern Caribbean Dollar as their currency. The ECCB was established in 1983, succeeding the British Caribbean Currency Board (1950-1965) and the Eastern Caribbean Currency Authority (1965-1983). It is also in charge of bank supervision within its geographical remit.
Cheddi Berret Jagan was a Guyanese politician and dentist who was first elected Chief Minister in 1953 and later Premier of British Guiana from 1961 to 1964. He later served as President of Guyana from 1992 to his death in 1997. In 1953, he became the first person of Indian descent to be a head of government outside of the Indian subcontinent.
The British West Indies dollar (BWI$) was the currency of British Guiana and the Eastern Caribbean territories of the British West Indies from 1949 to 1965, when it was largely replaced by the East Caribbean dollar, and was one of the currencies used in Jamaica from 1954 to 1964. The monetary policy of the currency was overseen by the British Caribbean Currency Board (BCCB). It was the official currency used by the West Indies Federation The British West Indies dollar was never used in British Honduras, the Cayman Islands, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas, or Bermuda.
Hugh Desmond Hoyte was a Guyanese politician who served as Prime Minister of Guyana from 1984 to 1985 and President of Guyana from 1985 until 1992.
Linden Forbes Sampson Burnham was a Guyanese politician and the leader of the Co-operative Republic of Guyana from 1964 until his death in 1985. He served as Premier of British Guiana from 1964 to 1966, Prime Minister of Guyana from 1964 to 1980 and then as the first Executive President of Guyana from 1980 to 1985. He is often regarded as a strongman who embraced his own version of socialism.
The Guyanese dollar has been the unit of account in Guyana since 29 January 1839. Originally it was intended as a transitional unit to facilitate the changeover from the Dutch guilder system of currency to the British pound sterling system. The Spanish dollar was already prevalent throughout the West Indies in general, and from 1839, the Spanish dollar unit operated in British Guiana in conjunction with British sterling coins at a standard conversion rate of one dollar for every four shillings and twopence. In 1951 the British sterling coinage was replaced with a new decimal coinage which was simultaneously introduced through all the British territories in the Eastern Caribbean. When sterling began to depreciate in the early 1970s, a switch to a US dollar peg became increasingly attractive as an anti-inflationary measure and the Eastern Caribbean Currency Authority made the switch in October 1975. The Guyanese dollar is normally abbreviated with the dollar sign $, or alternatively G$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies.
Arthur James Seymour, or A. J. Seymour, was a Guyanese poet, essayist, memoirist, and founding editor of the literary journal Kyk-Over-Al.
Georgetown City Hall is a nineteenth-century Gothic Revival building located on the corner of Regent Street and Avenue of the Republic in Georgetown, Guyana. The building was designed by architect Reverend Ignatius Scoles in 1887, and was completed in June 1889. The building houses the offices of the Mayor, the City Council, and the City Engineer.
Peter "Lauchmonen" Kempadoo was a writer and broadcaster from Guyana. He also worked as a development worker in the Caribbean, Africa and Asia. He moved in 1953 to the UK, where he built a career in print journalism as well as radio and television broadcasting, and published two novels, Guiana Boy in 1960 — the first novel by a Guyanese of Indian descent — and Old Thom's Harvest in 1965, before returning to Guyana in 1970. He died in London, aged 92.
The National Library of Guyana is the legal deposit and copyright library for Guyana. Unlike many national libraries, it is also a public lending library and the headquarters of Guyana's public library service, with branches extending throughout the country. Founded in 1909, the National Library of Guyana is situated on the corner of Church Street and Main Street in central Georgetown. In 2007, the library recorded a collection of 397,893 books and a total of 22,058 members. Its collection includes the papers of A. J. Seymour and Ian McDonald.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Guyana:
Guyana, officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north, Brazil to the south and southwest, Venezuela to the west, and Suriname to the east. With 215,000 km2 (83,000 sq mi), Guyana is the third-smallest sovereign state by area in mainland South America after Uruguay and Suriname, and is the second-least populous sovereign state in South America after Suriname; it is also one of the least densely populated countries on Earth. It has a wide variety of natural habitats and a very high biodiversity.
Cove and John is located on the Atlantic coast of Guyana, 18 miles east of Georgetown and bordered by Nabacalis to the west and Victoria to the east. It has a population of 494 people as of 2012. This village has the Guyana Sevashram.
Terry Vivekanand Gajraj is a Guyanese chutney and chutney-soca artist.
Mohamed Irfaan Ali is a Guyanese politician serving as the tenth and current president of Guyana since 2020. A member of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C), he previously served as the minister of Housing and water from 2009 to 2015. He is the first Muslim to hold office, and is the second Muslim head of state in the Americas after Noor Hassanali of Trinidad and Tobago.
The COVID-19 pandemic in Guyana was a part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. The virus was confirmed to have reached Guyana on 11 March 2020. The first case was a woman who travelled from New York, a 52-year-old woman with underlying health conditions, including diabetes and hypertension. The woman died at the Georgetown Public Hospital.
Banking in Guyana follows the country's tumultuous economics history, from formal introduction under British rule, the socialist-oriented nationalization of banks at independence, to IMF sponsored open-market initiatives. The banking industry faces increased pressure to meet global standards domestically, as well as attract international investors, and serve the large number of diaspora that remain economically tied to the country.
Clive Youlande Thomas is a Guyanese economics professor and political activist. He publishes on issues relating to development and poverty eradication in Guyana and the greater Caribbean region.
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