Local entrepreneurship: The example of Chocho Industries
In recent times, the President has, at a number of functions, stressed the need for us as a nation to promote and use made-in-Ghana goods.
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He even demonstrated this by showing to us in Parliament during his last visit to the august House a shoe he was wearing which was made by a local Ghanaian company.
To patronise made-in-Ghana goods means that we need to have local industries producing the goods. However, the problem has been the promotion of such local industries to produce the goods in Ghana for the consumption of Ghanaians.
It is in the light of this that the feat achieved by Suhum-based Chocho Industries Company Limited becomes my issue for this week. Last week, the company, owned by Alhaji Mustapha Oti Boateng, was awarded the Best Entrepreneur for 2013 by the Entrepreneur Foundation of Ghana. The company also received the Best Cosmetic and Personal Care Product of the year 2013 award from the foundation.
Made in Ghana goods
As we are all now talking about the need for us to consume made-in-Ghana goods, have we also thought about where the goods will come from? Are we talking about goods made on Ghanaian soil by foreigners or our aim is to encourage local industries to grow and produce the goods? One fact is that when foreign companies come in to produce goods here, first, they would only produce what they think we need and not what we actually need. Secondly, even if they produce what we need, they are most likely to repatriate their profits to their own countries.
Therefore, if our aim of promoting the use of made-in-Ghana goods is to boost our economy, then we must as well promote and encourage the establishment and growth of indigenous companies. When we give companies awards, as we have been doing for some time now, what becomes the value of the awards and what support does the country give to such companies.
It is not the first time that we are talking about promoting the use of made-in-Ghana goods. Under Kutu Acheampong’s government, it was on top of the national agenda, under the government’s Operation Feed Yourself programme. Also, Dan Lartey consistently called for this same policy under his ‘Domestication’ slogan.
Having been awarded the best entrepreneur in Ghana for 2013, what then becomes of Alhaji Oti Boateng and his company? What support can we, as a nation, give him and other indigenous companies to enable them grow and produce the needed goods here in Ghana?
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Visit to Chocho Industries
My desire to take up this challenge made me visit the Chocho Industries at Suhum last week. Before I started my journey, I had pictured in my mind to see the usual dilapidated and dirty structures some of our local industries use for the production of their goods. On arriving on the company premises, I kept asking my colleague with whom I travelled there where the company was, because the gates of the structure looked too posh for a local industry. However, I was proven wrong, it was indeed the premises of Chocho Industries.
Chocho Industries Company is sited in a very modern structure with such a neat and hygienic environment. My thoughts of how most local industries look like had been completely erased from my head by the time I left. After talking to Alhaji Oti Boateng and two managers of the company, Mrs Sadika Boateng Boadi, the Production Manager; and Mrs Aminah Boateng Adu-Twum, the Human Resource Manager, I became convinced that when given the right support and encouragement, Ghanaian companies could become global icons, which could bring foreign exchange to the country.
The beginning
Alhaji Oti Boateng, like most indigenous entrepreneurs, began in a very small way, producing his skin care cream in his small rented apartment in Accra and his soap at Breman Asikuma in the Central Region. Without any support, he began his business in 1998 with only GH¢40.00 (old ¢400,000). In 2003, he applied and received a formal certification from the Ghana Standards Authority.
Currently, the company has 150 workers made up of trained professionals who are producing the 15 different products it manufactures. Among the products are the popular Chocho Soap, Cream, Tea, Balm, Hair Food, and the now famous Chocho 34.
As is the case with most Ghanaian indigenous entrepreneurs, Alhaji Oti Boateng went through different situations, including being a commercial driver and later a driver of Maulvi Wahab Adam, the Ameer and Missionary of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission.
For lack of funds, Oti Boateng had to end his technical education at the Saint Paul Technical School at Kukurantumi after the second year. He later decided to learn how to drive and thereafter he became a commercial driver.
Travelling abroad
His association with Maulvi Adam gave him an opportunity to travel to the United Kingdom for a short course in printing, after which he became the head of the Ahmadiyya Printing Press in Accra for three years. After that, he had an opportunity to travel to Japan. “While in Japan I worked at a cosmetic factory in Nagoya City from where I learnt the production of skin creams and other products,” he recounts.
He explains that on his return from Japan he engaged himself in other activities before he later decided to go into the production of the skin care creams and other products based on his experience from the Nagoya cosmetic factory.
First production
“After my first production in 1998, His Holiness, Hadhrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad, Khalifa (Head) of the worldwide Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, whom I had known when he was teaching in Ghana as a missionary from 1977 to 1985, visited Ghana and after I showed him two of my products he prayed over them and blessed them. To me, that prayer and my belief in Allah is what has brought the company this far,” he said during my visit to the factory.
Besides his faith in God (Allah), he also says he has consistently made truthfulness the key to his business, by ensuring that no matter what happens he wants to provide his customers with quality products without any attempt to dilute the ingredients for his products in an attempt to increase production and thus increase profit. He, therefore, urged other indigenous companies to be faithful with their customers by producing quality products.
Commitment
With such a commitment, Chocho Industries definitely would need support to expand, not only to employ more people, but also target the international market to bring foreign exchange to the country. The various state agencies which deal with indigenous entrepreneurs and companies must ensure that such individuals and companies which have shown commitment to the growth of the national economy are supported.
As we keep on trumpeting the need for Ghanaians to patronise made-in-Ghana goods, there is an utmost need for us all to provide the needed support, including easy access to bank credit and other facilities which would enable the companies to expand.
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After being awarded the best entrepreneur of 2013, what can we, as a nation, do to help Alhaji Oti Boateng to expand his Chocho Industries to enable him to provide employment for more Ghanaians, and also enter the international market. This is what must concern us all while we urge ourselves to use made-in-Ghana products.
PS: Mr Inspector-General of Police, having openly accepted that the Police Service had done some wrong in recent past, would you please respond to the children and widow of Adjei Akpor, the 22-year-old man your men killed at Adenta on January 6, 2014 and give them justice? This is the 17th week since the man was killed.
The author is a Journalist and Political Scientist. He is the Head of the Department of Media and Communication Studies, Pentecost University College, Accra. -
Email: fasado@hotmail.com