The Environmental Protection Agency has rejected criticism of its staff training expenditure, saying it will not apologise for investing in the technical capacity needed to regulate Guyana's fast-growing economy.
In a statement issued on November 4, 2026 and reported by INews Guyana, the agency dismissed media questions over roughly $13.8 million in training spending as a manufactured controversy, arguing that a stronger regulator is exactly what the country's oil-driven expansion demands.
What the EPA actually spent the money on
The figures the agency released are specific. In 2025, 144 EPA employees took part in 77 distinct training programmes, producing 418 training participations in total.
The courses covered environmental legislation, compliance inspections, environmental risk assessment, oil spill response, emergency planning, incident command, radiological environmental impact assessment and public procurement.
The EPA argued these are core competencies for an agency responsible for assessing environmental impacts, enforcing compliance and responding to emergencies in a sector where the cost of failure is measured in coastline and livelihoods.
The agency's argument, in its own words
The statement was pointed. Critics, the EPA said, have spent years claiming the agency lacks the capacity to regulate oil and gas, often citing assessments dating back to 2018. Now that the agency is spending money to fix precisely that gap, the same people call the spending wasteful.
One cannot credibly demand stronger regulatory capacity while simultaneously condemning the investments necessary to build it, the agency said.
It also rejected the idea that its mandate is to block development outright. Guyana needs to develop, the EPA said, and its job is to ensure projects proceed with proper environmental safeguards, not to say an automatic yes or no. Where risks are unacceptable or cannot be managed, the agency said it will exercise its regulatory authority.
Why this matters for Guyana's development model
The spat is about more than a line item in a budget. It goes to a question that will define the next decade of Guyanese public life: can the state grow fast enough, and competently enough, to oversee the economy the oil sector has created?
The government has insisted it takes transparency in the extractive sector seriously, reaffirming that commitment at the recent EITI Board meeting and Global Conference, according to INews Guyana. An EPA that trains its inspectors properly is part of that same promise. A regulator that cannot assess a radiological impact study, or run an incident command system during an oil spill, is a regulator in name only.
There is a live example of the stakes. Kaieteur News reports that uranium exploration at the Kurupung property, controlled by Canada-based U92 Energy Inc. through its subsidiary LIA (Guyana) Inc., remains stalled after seven organisations and more than 50 citizens, including former EPA Executive Director Dr. Vincent Adams, appealed an EPA decision. The Environmental Assessment Board has yet to rule. Whatever the board decides, the case shows why an agency competent in radiological environmental impact assessment matters, and why the EPA's training list reads less like a perk and more like a job description.
Where criticism is still fair
The EPA's defence would be stronger if it engaged the substance of the reporting rather than the tone. Saying that a sensational headline is not a credible assessment of institutional performance is fair. But taxpayers are entitled to ask follow-up questions the statement did not fully answer: how the 418 participations were selected, what measurable outcomes the programmes produced, and whether the procurement of the training itself was competitive.
The agency said criticism grounded in facts, evidence and a genuine understanding of environmental governance is welcome. That is the right standard, and it cuts both ways. The EPA should publish the details of its training programme, the providers used and the competencies gained, so the public can judge the $13.8 million on results rather than on anyone's rhetoric.
What is not credible is the opposite habit, common in Guyana's polarised debate, of treating any public spending as suspect by default. A state that is collecting record oil revenues either invests in its institutions or watches them drown in the workload. Training 144 people in oil spill response is not the scandal. An agency that stopped learning while the economy quadrupled around it would be.
FAQ
How much did the EPA spend on training in 2025?
Approximately $13.8 million, covering 77 training programmes and 418 training participations involving 144 employees.
What kind of training did EPA staff receive?
Programmes covered environmental legislation, compliance inspections, environmental risk assessment, oil spill response, emergency planning, incident command, radiological environmental impact assessment and public procurement.
Why is the EPA defending the expenditure?
The agency says the training builds the technical capacity needed to regulate Guyana's expanding economy, and that critics who long claimed the EPA was under-resourced cannot now object to the investment that addresses it.