Cape Coast, Aug. 9, GNA - Participants at a three-day workshop on Export Marketing Management have called on the Government and other stakeholders to clear the barriers that hindered smooth trade within the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). They pointed out that the 16-member countries had a lot to share in terms of trade but expressed concern that most member states could not easily undertake effective business transactions due to the artificial barriers and boundaries thereby killing the business initiative of their members.

The workshop, which was organized by the Ghana Export School of the Export Promotion Council in collaboration with the Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Central Regional Development Commission, is to among others, ensure successful exporting, provide basic information on practical export marketing techniques and enhance the marketing operating skills of exporters.

The workshop, which is being attended by potential exporters, financial institutions, district assemblies and Small and Medium Scale Enterprises, is expected to help participants improve their product quality and packaging to enhance product competitiveness, understand the elements of the export marketing mix, enhance strategies for success in the international trade business and understand an export marketing plan. The participants also called on the Central Regional Development Commission (CEDECOM) to effectively collaborate with the various universities to enable the universities to showcase their research findings on the preservation and production of quality goods to meet the demands of international market.

They noted with concern that most of the research finding of universities were allowed to gather dust on shelves instead of being used to enhance the lives of Ghanaians. Mr Amarh Ashitey, Deputy Coordinating Director of the Cape Coast Metropolitan Assembly, pointed out that the nation had a lot of products it could export but the poor packaging of goods prevented the Ghanaian exporters from meeting the demands of the international market. According to him international consumers were looking for value for money and would not go in for goods which were poorly produced and packaged and called on the Export Promotion Council to critically consider the packaging sector of the Trade Industry.

Mr Kenneth Osei-Karikari, Head, Investment Promotion of CEDECOM, said the region had investment opportunities in areas like Tourism, Agriculture, Mining, Real Estate and ICT and urged local investors to take advantage of the potentials to market the region outside Ghana. He asked them to effectively network with other investors within and outside the country to help develop the region. Mr Samuel Brew, a Director at the Ghana Export Promotion Council, explained that most Ghanaians were facing problems in the export sector because they did not know or fully understand the rules of the game. He pointed out that the export market was very competitive and that an exporter could only be successful if he was able to produce quality, reliable and consistent goods.

Mr Brew said the standards of goods and services should not be compromised in the export market since the market was full of best products from all over the world in terms of price, quality, reliability of supply, flexibility of payment as well as responsiveness to the needs of the consumers.

He noted with concern that poor business attitudes contributed about 70 percent of business failures in Ghana and urged the participants to be proactive and engage in healthy businesses. Mr Brew said GEPC was doing everything possible to develop more exports for the ECOWAS markets which he explained was cheaper in term of transportation than the European market.

The participants in the next three days would be treating topics like Export Potentials in the Central Region, Good Post-harvest Handling of Horticultural Products for Export and Requirement on Standards for Export and Quality Assurance.