“Rescind your decision” – MOTI Appeals to Business Associations.
The Ministry of Trade and Industry has appealed to the various business associations in the country to rescind their decision to embark on a joint strike action on Wednesday March 4, 2015.
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Issues relating to high cost of doing business, the energy crises, the proposed Ghana Conformity Assessment Programme (G-CAP) and the Advance Shipment Information System (ASHI) have been sighted as some of the concerns that have necessitated the strike action.
A statement issued by the Trade Ministry on Tuesday said it recognises and appreciates some of the challenges businesses are going through at the moment but wishes to appeal to the various associations not to aggravate the country’s economic situation by withdrawing their commercial services from customers, suppliers and various business stakeholders who have caused them no harm.
It said the Ministry of Trade and Industry has already taken steps to address most of their concerns.
“The associations are aware of the leadership role MOTI is taking to fight for the reduction of interest rate, to decongest the harbour by reducing the number of operators there, as well as promote Made-in-Ghana goods so as to increase the demand for local production and to strengthen employment.”
It said the Ministry has also suspended the implementation of the Ghana Conformity Assessment Programme (G-CAP) to allow for deeper consultation with stakeholders.
Indeed, the leaders of several associations have been involved in numerous interactions with MOTI as we work towards the afore mentioned interventions.
It noted that at a time when Ghana was making progress in “ease of Doing Business” rankings, as well as “attractiveness to Foreign Investment”, embarking on a strike will give Ghana a negative reputation in international business circles, as the intended strike would affect the various international partners and interlocutors of the business and industry players.
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Again, with recent announcement of the successful IMF negotiations with government, which is expected to inject a large volume of new public and private sector capital into the country, the decision of the business associations to go on strike could be misconstrued to mean a disappointment with the success of the IMF negotiations and an organised effort to undermine the national economy, it observed.
It said in his recent state of the nation address, President John Dramani Mahama pledged to fix the energy crises and outlined plans the government has initiated to increase Ghana’s generation capacity by over 3,000 megawatts.
Based on this, the Ministry of Trade and Industry “wishes to appeal to the various commercial and industry groups to use all available channels of negotiations with relevant government agencies, rather than take actions that will reduce Ghana’s GDP growth, cause unemployment, dislocate various business and industry value chains and worsen Ghana’s economic prospects.