Guyana expects billion-dollar oil earnings this year

By BERT WILKINSON
Associated Press

GEORGETOWN, Guyana (AP) — Guyana’s central bank says the South American country is likely to earn more than $1 billion this year from its production share of offshore oil exports. That’s more than it will garner from gold, bauxite, timber or any other sector. The small nation became an oil producer in 2019 when Exxon lifted the first batch of oil from the seabed — four years after it had announced a massive find about 120 miles offshore Guyana. Finance Minister Ashni Singh recently projected that gross domestic product would grow by 56% this year, by far the fastest pace in the hemisphere.