Ghana not taking advantage of AGOA - Bannerman

The Chief Executive of Sleek Garments, Nora Bannerman, has expressed worry that the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) is not being fully utilised by the country.

She said the AGOA initiative offered Ghana a unique opportunity to export value-added goods to the US to earn foreign exchange.
Ms Bannerman said in an interview with the Ghana News Agency that Ghana was gradually becoming a consumer nation instead of a producer and that government and industry must safeguard the economy of the county.

She said manufacturing industries were sliding day by day because there was not much skilled labour despite the abundant human resources coupled with electricity and water problems.

She added that skills training in specialised areas could be very useful in raising the country’s economy and appealed to the government to step in since the private sector alone could not train such skilled labour.

Ms Bannerman said her company needed about 700 men to operate to capacity but she is only able to employ 300 due to the lack of skilled labour.