Constrained trade and creative exchange on the barima river, guyana

This article examines entrepreneurial activities among Amerindian residents of the Barima River, Guyana. It argues that Barima residents create entrepreneurial opportunities by exploiting a trading system constructed by a French palm-heart processing company as rigidly non-negotiable. This mercantilism is further enabled by the fact that the river itself constitutes an artery of neighbouring economic zones, in which distinct regimes of production, exchange, and consumption dominate at different points along the waterway. By moving exchange goods along this river, entrepreneurs are able to use a particular location, a centre of small-scale gold-mining, as an economic amplifier which allows them to realize profits.