US Cities to strengthen relations with Commonwealth countries

Mrs Mary Kane, President of Sister Cities International, (SCI) has said the United State of America (USA) is looking forward to strengthening partnership with Commonwealth countries towards socio-economic advancement.

She said the relationship would be based on sustained development in culture, tourism, education, agriculture and health.

Mrs Kane announced this at the Ghana Sister Cities Mayoral Forum with Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives in Accra.

It was on the theme: “Establishing Sisters Cities Partnership for Socio-Economic Development.”

She noted that the relationship would pave the way for other countries and cities to cross share their culture and dynamism across the globe towards changing the mindset of young people to promote exchange of programmes and job creation.

Mrs Kane explained that with the relationships, business entrepreneurs would also network in sharing ideas, contacts and creating job opportunities for each other.

She said the SCI initiatives were operational in more than 136 countries and had more than 2,000 offices in six continents.

These were valuable to the development of those countries, she said, and urged countries which were not involved to take the opportunity to develop their cities by creating relationships with other international cities.

Mrs Kane encouraged the youth to develop global relationships and share ideas and good stories about their cities both nationally and internationally.

Mrs Kane would inaugurate the Sister City Global Technology Centre of Africa of the Global Sister Cities Foundation, a partner organisation based in Accra.

Professor Lorna K. Johnson, a Consultant of SCI, said her outfit was creating worldwide sister cities partnership with Africa and USA, which made tremendous contributions to the socio-economic development of sister cities in Africa.

She noted that Ghana needed to take on a leadership role in Africa to help build relations with international partners for her future development.

Prof. Johnson said working with sister cities and regions promoted sustainable and economic development, humanitarian assistance, youth education through exchange programmes and increasing international aid.

She said Louisville, a city in the US and Tamale were the most recognised cities in Ghana, and this prompted other cities to be involved in the creation of relationships with other cities.