The Ghana Investments Promotion Centre (GIPC) recorded a total of 95 new projects with an estimated value of $1.8 billion for the first quarter of 2012. This represents an increase of 67.98 percent compared to the value recorded in the same quarter of 2011.

The Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) component of the estimated value of the newly-registered projects amounted to 979.85 million while the total initial capital transfers for the quarter amounted to $43.27 million.

George Aboagye, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of GIPC, who made these known to the media in Accra, said the USA, with an FDI value of $407 million, ranked first while China registered more projects.

He said of the 95 projects registered, 52, representing 54.17 percent were wholly-foreign owned enterprises valued at GH¢422.77 million while the remaining 43 projects were joint ventures between Ghanaians and foreign partners and valued at GH¢1.29 billion.

The total foreign equity was GH536.19 million and the initial equity transfers was GH¢73.57 million. It is expected that 4,468 jobs will be created from the projects registered.

According to Mr Aboagye, the centre embarked on re-registration of companies about two years ago. This formed part of GIPC’s monitoring and evaluation strategies of investment activities in the country.

“These companies have created 43,923 actual jobs from the registered projects, 2,532 jobs of which are for non-Ghanaians. At the time of the initial registration with the centre, a total of 24,028 jobs were expected to be created. The current investment at the time of the re-registration by the companies is $982.91 million.”