APNU pledges corporation tax break, small business financing opportunities

Last Updated on Saturday, 16 August 2025, 8:53 by Writer

The People’s National Congress Reform-led A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) on Friday unveiled its 2025 general and regional elections manifesto, promising to reduce corporate tax and increase business financing opportunities.

“We have a broad range of policies to energize the business sector. Towards that end, we will progressively reduce the corporation taxes to global standards of 20 to 30 percent and modify regulations to give predictability to tax benefits,” PNCR-APNU presidential candidate Aubrey Norton told the launching ceremony held at the Pegasus Corporate Suites.

The document states that the APNU hopes that the gradual reduction of corporation tax from 45% to 35% will make companies competitive, attract foreign direct investment and discourage tax evasion.

Regulations, the manifesto states, will be modified to make tax benefits predictable with attached conditions such as allowing corporations an expense deduction for the cost of retraining workforce in skills needed to aid developments across various sectors.

Also promises is a reduction of the tax on four-door four-wheel drive vehicles to 15% on the cost only, excluding insurance and freight. “This initiative will promote new levels of development in agriculture, construction, mining and tourism,” the documents states.

In terms of financing, he said an APNU administration would reintroduce a development bank as the previous long-term financing facility was closed by the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPPC) administration. “Our goal is simple. We intend to fill the finance gap between the large and small producers where investments risks, risk is high and the potential for investment success becomes a reality,” the veteran politician told his supporters.

The current PPPC administration is also promising to open a development bank and offer interest-free loans to small businesses and innovative start-ups.

Should the development bank be realised under an APNU-led administration, he said his government would consider adding an export-import window to support international businesses that want to venture overseas. He said the public-private partnership technique would be used in foreign direct investment to skip constraints that restrict the access of Guyana’s products to foreign markets. “We will stand behind any investor of manufactured goods because we know from global statistics that trade in manufactured goods bring more export revenue,” he said.

Mr Norton said while a number of business models, such as monopolies and those with growth models can easily access financing from local commercial banks, there are others, because of their size and nature of their operation, that find borrowing costs “prohibitive.” Aiming to expand the supply of consumer goods, he said domestic producers must be able to access from “whichever sources make sense. Experience has shown that no one source can meet all needs, and so we need to expand the sources of finance.”

Saying that Guyana’s economy relies heavily on small businesses, Mr Norton added that they would be provided with adequate locations and facilities for vending, enjoy subsidized electricity and rent, and assured of access to adequate amounts of foreign currency because “a fundamental ingredient for any business is finance.”

The APNU presidential candidate said if his coalition wins the September 1 general and regional elections, his administration would take steps to establish a junior stock exchange as another source of financing for small companies. “We intend to unlock the full potential of the stock market so that it can serve as an alternative source of financing,” he said. The plan, according to Mr Norton, is to amend the Securities Industry Act to pave the way for the establishment of a junior stock market.

APNU also promises to increase funding to the Small Business Bureau by “several billion dollars” annually and ease the qualification requirements.

Also on the cards to prime the business financing portfolio is expanding the financial technology (FinTech) market to add other services such as lending platforms and investment platforms to existing services such as digital banking, mobile money and payment solutions.