AGI okays Development Bank Ghana

The President of the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI), Dr Yaw Adu Gyamfi, has described the government’s efforts to establish the development bank as timely, saying it would boost the production capacity and meet the financial needs of industry players in the country.

He said the move, which the AGI had advocated for years, was key to the ultimate development of the country, especially in the context of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

Dr Gyamfi, who was speaking at the launch of the 10th AGI Industry and Quality Awards in Accra yesterday, said the development bank would help industries to increase their capacity to produce in large volumes for export to other parts of Africa.

He observed that access to capital was one of the dominant challenges faced by businesses in the country; hence, the bank would help businesses to access medium to long-term capital to retool, buy machines, expand and set up new businesses.

“Efforts by the government to set up the Development Bank Ghana are also much welcome because access to credit and cost of credit remain major challenges for our small and medium enterprises (SMEs),” he said.

The AfCFTA, he said, had the potential of becoming one of the world’s largest markets and thus presented businesses with myriad of opportunities.

“It is, therefore, extremely important that industry gets the needed support to build its local production and manufacturing infrastructure to add value to its commodities for export, as well as develop the capacities of the human resource to fully benefit from the AfCFTA,” he added.

Awards

The 10th edition of the awards had been dubbed: “Repositioning Local Industry to Leverage AfCFTA”.

The AGI Industry Awards rewards and honours companies that have achieved outstanding successes in various areas of industry and innovation in the year under review.

The awards are presented under seven major categories and 23 sector awards.

Eight loyal sponsors of the awards — OLAM Ghana, B5 Plus, Wilmar Africa, Activa International Insurance, GB Foods, Samartex, Nexans Kabelmetal Ltd, Ghacem, Ecobank, and Mericom Solution — were presented with certificates at the launch.

Targeted interventions 

The Chairperson of the Awards Planning Committee, Mrs Nora Bannerman-Abbott, explained that the country’s local industries needed more targeted interventions from the government to re-position towards AfCFTA.

She noted that the committee had also instituted a new award category, titled: The Dr Esther Ocloo Award, as a tribute to a prominent entrepreneur whose vision to give economic empowerment to women and to promote indigenous businesses gave birth to the AGI.

That award category, she said, would be for SMEs which had demonstrated resilience and perseverance, among others. 

She said the call for nominations would be open to the public in the first week of June this year.

Quality

For his part, the Director-General of the Ghana Standards Authority (GSA), Prof. Alex Dodoo, underscored the need for indigenous companies to meet quality requirements before the implementation of the AfCFTA.

“I believe that Ghanaian companies can export to Africa and beyond. However, we have to meet the needs of the market, and that is where quality comes in,” he said.

He noted that the GSA and the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) would avail themselves to assist businesses to meet the quality requirements and standards in order to be able to export their products.