We take this opportunity to wish everyone a joyful and prosperous 2024. We pray for peace in our country, our region, and globally. In particular, we pray for solutions to ensure that no child must suffer from war, hunger, or disease, no matter where they live.
Last week, I wrote that 2024 will be a momentous year for Guyana. I am confident that President Irfaan Ali will lead the PPP Government in making 2024 the most transformative year in Guyana’s history. For one thing, his announcement during the New Year’s Day Message confirmed the Government’s plan to remove university fees; lift the overall educational system; and take further steps to alleviate the cost of living, being driven by global circumstances such as wars in Ukraine and Palestine.
There are global threats and seemingly insurmountable challenges that Guyana and other countries around the world would have to navigate. This column has often argued that Guyana has navigated these challenges better than many more powerful and wealthier countries than ours. I am confident that President Ali and the PPP Government would safely navigate Guyana through the perilous pathways and challenges that stand in our way. I am confident that 2024 will be a momentous year for our country.
Some of the things Guyana and other countries around the world will have to navigate include the overall global economy, climate change, Artificial Intelligence (AI), the migration crisis, wars and conflicts. These are issues that would impact the lives of every Guyanese and everyone on the planet. How governments navigate these challenges will have profound implications for the wellbeing of citizens and countries. We are fortunate that President Ali and his Government have shown the capacity to navigate Guyana through these difficult paths safely.
In 2024, some elections can have significant impacts on Guyana and the world. There is an election scheduled in Venezuela that has enormous significance for Guyana. There is a good chance that the elections will be rigged, and that Mad Maduro will have many more years to threaten Guyana and the Zone of Peace for the Region. But, if the Western democracies are successful in their bid to promote free and fair elections in Venezuela, the ICJ pathway that Guyana has submitted itself to will have the potential to end the Guyana/Venezuela border controversy. Maduro has rejected, while the combined opposition has accepted, the ICJ as the way forward.
Elections in several other countries: such as the US, EU, India, the UK, Russia, and even Israel, could also determine a swing in the balance of power that could have profound global implications. These elections have increasingly become battles between progressives and conservatives, nationalists and internationalists, climate change vs anti-climate change proponents, and migration vs anti-migration proponents.
Whoever wins election in these powerful countries would have a licence to effect consequential social changes. These social changes will impact Guyana’s development in 2024 and for years to come; in particular the global pathways in climate change, migration, and the wars in Ukraine and Palestine could be affected by these elections, which could have consequences for Guyana.
Climate change has had a severe impact on Guyana’s development already. COP28, where Guyana played a leading advocacy role, was disappointing to most of the world, as powerful countries continued to abrogate their responsibilities. COP28 was oblivious to the urgency of averting the catastrophic effects of climate change, and failed to recognize the rapidly escalating crisis. Guyana spoke eloquently of clean energy, carbon capture, and low carbon development strategies as part of the solution, and spoke about payments for carbon credits.
Already earning about US$800M until 2030, Guyana has the potential to raise an additionally sum that is more than US$2B from carbon credits by 2030. Elections in countries like the US, UK, EU and India have consequential impacts on how the world tackles climate change, and, in turn, these will impact Guyana in negative and positive ways. This is why leadership in Guyana is important. While Guyana is hoping for a global trajectory that would be positive for Guyana, Guyana is already readying Plan B to ensure negative impacts on climate change, because election results in other countries do not severely impact us.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is part of everyday life, and Guyana has already been impacted. I will avoid the temptation of an exhaustive discussion on AI and what it means for life at this time, since AI discussion will take the whole of several columns. However, AI will play a critical role in healthcare in Guyana. By the end of 2024, AI will become an integral part of imaging diagnostics – radiologists will be aided by AI in interpreting images from ultrasound, X-rays, CT and MRI. Already, using AI X-rays in prisons in many African countries has led to an increase in TB diagnostics, picking up more than 16% of new cases that were missed by radiologists. Guyana has made the bold move, and already GPHC is using a limited AI capacity. In January of 2024, AI will be utilised to help in interpretation in the pathology lab that will be critical for cancer diagnostics. A brave new world that has already crept into GPHC will become well-established in Guyana by the end of 2024.
The shift in global economics: where the US, the UK and the EU no longer control global economies and the economic focal point becomes BRICS and other Asian powers, could alter trade and market possibilities.
Elections in the US, UK, EU and India could either delay or accelerate this potential.
Similarly, how global migration is managed could lead to severe social changes. Guyana is not immune from these economic and social changes. Even with the multitude of global threats, Guyana is looking at a transformative, momentous 2024.