Govt targets increased investment for textiles
The government is targeting increased investment in the textile industry to enable Ghanaian manufacturing companies to take advantage of the growing opportunities in the international market, President John Dramani Mahama has said.
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Already the cotton industry, which in Ghana serves as the raw material base, is receiving an appreciable measure of attention, and government plans to extend its focus to finished products.
President Mahama said this when he paid a familiarization visit to Dignity DTRT company, a garment production company in Accra yesterday.
The company, a joint venture between Ghanaian ( majority shareholders ) and American partners, produces T-Shirts and other products for the US market.
The President said the visit was the first in a series he was embarking on to Ghanaian companies in a bid to encourage and support them to improve production.
AGOA
President Mahama mentioned how attempts by Ghanaian companies to take advantage of the Africa Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) in the past could not achieve the maximum results because of failure to beat competition from the Asian market.
However, he said, all was not lost as new opportunities were available to explore.
Diversifying economy
The President stressed the need for the diversification of the economy saying " we cannot continue to rely on primary products to drive our economy."
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That was why in his State of the Nation Address this year, he touched on the need for a shift to value addition.
President Mahama said since then, the government had taken action to invest heavily in agriculture.
This had started yielding dividends as rice production, for instance, had seen a 60 per cent increase.
The President said he met the poultry farmers association last Wednesday who thanked him for the tremendous support given to them.
He commended the management and staff of Dignity DTRT for the good work they were doing and promised that the government would support them to improve production to enable them to provide more jobs for the youth.
Welcoming speech
Briefing the President, the Chief Finance Officer of the company, Mr Dela Gomado, said the company currently had a workforce of 600, which they hoped to increase to about 1080 by December in order to meet the increased orders.
He appealed to the government for support so as to surmount the number of challenges facing the company, including equipment for production.