Government to encourage long-term lending - Kufuor

The Government is developing strategies to encourage the financial sector to develop long-term capitals to support industry, President John Agyekum Kufuor said this on Friday.

He said the best support the government could give to local industries was to create the enabling economic and political atmosphere and encourage joint ventures from outside to inject capital, technological know-how and open extra markets. "Such long-term financial assistance would make Ghana a more competitive market in the West African Sub-Region."

President Kufuor said this when he unveiled a plaque to commission multi-billion cedis pharmaceutical manufacturing plant for Ernest Chemist at Tema. The plant has the capacity to produce 400 million tablets, 100 million capsules, 300,000 litres or 3,200,000 bottles of oral liquids (syrups and tonics).

It could also produce 400,000 litres of non-oral liquids (disinfectants, liniments, liquid soap and many others) 750,000 bottles of suspension in dry powder form for paediatric use per annum. President Kufuor said foreign investments would only come into the country when Ghanaian entrepreneurs demonstrated confidence and invested in Ghana themselves.

Mr Robin Gwynn, Acting British High Commissioner in Ghana, said last year total value of Ghana-United Kingdom (UK) trade was about 278 million pounds divided almost equally between imports and exports. He said UK was not only the largest provider of non-oil goods and services to Ghana but also more importantly the largest purchaser thus helping Ghana to develop her own prosperity.

He disclosed that Ghana continued to be one of the top two markets in West Africa for British business. Mr Gwynn said over the years, Britain had consistently been the largest investor in Ghana with an estimated 500 million pounds of investments in business in the country. Currently there are about 124 companies with British equity registered with the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) and remains Ghana's largest non-oil trading partner.

Mr Gwynn said the British government would support the government's policy on Golden Age of Business because it was the integral part of the strategy for reducing poverty and encouraging economic growth, adding "we will continue to work bilaterally with other donors and in multilateral frameworks such as the G8 to help the development of Ghana and other countries in Africa which are moving forward".

Mr Ernest Bediako-Sampong, Chief Executive Officer of Ernest Chemist, said the company began as a sole trading business in Accra in 1986 and in 1993 a limited liability company was formed with its distribution network in Accra and in Kumasi in 1998 to cater for the northern sector.

The Chief Executive said for the Golden Age of Business to become a reality, government should create an industrial estate in the country. Mr Bediako-Sampong, appealed to the government to support local industries to withstand undue foreign competition to enable them to grow and stand on their feet and compete evenly as pertaining in other countries.

He called for a national machine shop to produce spare parts for industries, while the financial institutions made available to industrialists long-term capital at reasonable interest rates. Oyeeman Wereko Ampem II, Gyaasehene of Akwapim Traditional Area, who chaired the function, called on entrepreneurs to take advantage of the stock market in the country for long-term capital support to improve on their ventures.

He said the future of entrepreneurship in the country depended on the ability of the Ghanaian entrepreneur to take advantage of the opportunities offered by the enabling economic environment to serve the country through increased production for local consumption and export to ECOWAS markets.