Guyana sits on the northern coast of South America and is one of only four non-Hispanic countries on the continent, sharing a border with Suriname, Brazil and Venezuela. Culturally similar to the West Indies and other English-speaking nations in the Caribbean, Guyana’s population of just fewer than one million people reside mainly on a narrow Atlantic coastal plain, with less than one in ten living inland in the dense rain forests or mountains.

Balata production was once one of the mainstays of the economy in the recent past but deforestation of the trees that bled the natural latex led to its demise. Nowadays, the production of sugar accounts for a sizeable proportion of the nation’s export income, along with the mining of a variety of minerals, the logging of timber and shrimp fishing.

Sport, especially cricket and football, features prominently in the lives of the locals but with only one 9-hole golf course in play at Lusignan, it’s hard to see another youngster from this part of South America breaking through to emulate the recent golf feats of Colombian Camilio Villegas.