Ashigbey commends Prez for directive on printing of textbooks
The Managing Director (MD) of the Graphic Communications Group Limited (GCGL), Mr Kenneth Ashigbey, has lauded President John Mahama for directing that all the six million textbooks that the government intends to distribute to public schools in 2015 should be printed locally.
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He, however, appealed to the state agencies tasked with the implementation of that directive to ensure that it was carried out to the letter.
Speaking at the Graphic Business-Fidelity Bank Breakfast Meeting in Accra today, Mr Ashigbey explained that printing all the six million copies locally would help provide business for indigenous printing enterprises.
While renewing the campaign to buy made-in-Ghana products, Mr Ashigbey said local entrepreneurs needed support from all and sundry to help grow their businesses, a development which must be exemplified by the government.
"Indigenous entrepreneurs need support from you and I to grow. If we patronise their goods and services, if we stop buying everything foreign but rather buy from them, then they will get more market to grow and also become big companies like the foreign businesses," Mr Ashigbey said.
Themed: “Supporting Ghanaian/Local Entrepreneurs”, the event was also used to relaunch the Graphic Business, the business and financial newspaper of the GCGL.
A proper implementation of the President's directive is expected to help bring some relief to the printing industry, which has been crumbling partly because of business flights to foreign markets, power shortage and the yearly decline in the value of the cedi against major foreign currencies.
Currently, about 40 per cent of government's printing business is done outside, leaving the remaining 60 per cent for the hundreds of printing companies, including Graphic Packaging, the printing and publishing wing of the Graphic Group, to compete for.
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Series of dialogues
The breakfast meeting, an initiative of the Graphic Group and the bank, is a series of dialogues which features selected government officials, policy makers and private sector operators aimed at influencing government policies in favour of businesses.
The meeting was chaired by Ms Mawuena Trebah, the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Investment
Promotion Council (GIPC) with Mr Rashid Pelpuo, the Minister of Private Sector Development and Public Partnership, as the guest of honour.
It brought together players in the private sector, policy makers and people from government to deliberate on how the country can support indigenous entrepreneurs to thrive.
Force MMDAs to procure locally
Taking the campaign to support indigenous businesses a step further, the Graphic MD said it was necessary for the government to mandate municipal, metropolitan and district assemblies (MMDAs) to procure 90 per cent of their goods and services from locally owned enterprises.
Additionally, Mr Ashigbey said it was imperative for the government to make it a policy that at least 90 per cent of the edibles at all government-sponsored events will be sourced from locally grown foodstuffs.
While admitting that those policies could appear unfavorable to foreign enterprises operating in the country, he said they should not be misconstrued to mean localisation, given that they were required to help grow indigenous entrepreneurship.
"We need to stop importing things and patronise products from our own," he said.
The President of the Entrepreneurs Foundation, Mr Sam Ato Gaisie, admitted that indigenous enterprises required support, especially at this time that the entire economy was going through some challenges.
He mentioned access to credit, power shortage, influx of foreign products and the cedi depreciation as some of the key challenges that needed to be addressed to help create an enabling environment for businesses to operate.