Need to revamp culture to promote tourism - Ankamah

Koforidua, Oct.20, GNA - Mr Joseph Ankamah, Eastern Regional Director of the Centre for National Culture (CNC) has called for the revamping of the country's culture to support tourism. He said for tourism to achieve its objective as a major foreign exchange earner for the country by 2007, then institutions that promote culture, should be resourced to improve on their activities. Mr Ankamah made the call when briefing the media on activities for the third Eastern Regional Cultural Week celebrations at Koforidua on Wednesday.

The celebrations begin from the November 3, as a prelude to the annual National Festival of Arts and Culture (NAFAC). Highlights of the celebrations include, seminars, debates, cultural and tourism exposition, exhibition of Ghanaian dishes, traditional beauty pageant, and highlife contest and choral music competition. Mr Ankamah stressed the need for more resources to the cultural institutions to undertake more research activities and programmes to promote dancing and drumming for the tourism industry to make headway. He said tourists, after they visiting the tourist attraction sites leave the country with cultural products that facilitates the tourism industry.

Mr Ankamah mentioned cultural products such as Kente and Adinkra, beads and jewels, traditional paintings and carvings that should be promoted in the same vein as tourist sites. The Regional Director stressed the need for Ghanaians to see the essence of culture as an integral part of nation building, "because the country can no longer rely on the traditional exports such as cocoa and gold to develop, unless the Ghanaian culture is improved." Mr Ankamah said the decline in the country's economy was not by politicians but neglect of culture to rely on cultures from other countries detrimental to the country's socio-economic development. He said, "Ghanaians do not patronise textiles produced in the country leading to the collapse of the textile industry. The "National Friday Wear" programme has not been embraced because most of our leaders failed to participate."

Mr Ankamah therefore, appealed to Ghanaians to patronize made-in-Ghana goods to improve upon the economy, and urged the media not only to highlight political issues but also focus more on culture and issues that promote growth of the economy. He conducted the newsmen around the on-going eight billion cedis cultural centre for the region.

Mr Ankamah appealed to the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning to allocate more funds for the early completion of the project. The project has a sitting capacity of 2,000 and comprise of a theatre, galleries and a hostel.