Valco Contributes $1.6 Billion in Taxes

The Volta Aluminium Company (VALCO) has contributed over 1.6 billion dollars in taxes to the Ghanaian economy since its establishment 30 years ago.

Dr. Charles Mensah, VALCO Resident Director said on Monday that VALCO, the largest corporate taxpayer in the country, contributes 10 percent of the total taxes more than Ashanti Goldfields and Unilever Ghana Limited.

He was speaking during a visit to the VALCO Aluminium Smelter at Tema by Capt. (rtd) Nkrabeah Effah-Darteh, Deputy Minister of Local Government and Rural Development who was on a visit to the Tema Municipality.

The visit was to encourage the industries to assist the Tema Municipal Assembly (TMA) in its environmental and sanitation and revenue generation programmes.Dr Mensah said VALCO has also paid over 700 million dollars in fees to the Volta River Authority (VRA) since 1967.

Apart from this VALCO has contributed over 43 million dollars through the VALCO Fund to charity adding, "We are five times bigger than the Ghana National Trust Fund".

He said VALCO, as an individual company is the eighth largest contributor of foreign exchange to the Ghanaian economy.

Dr Mensah said it is also significant to note that the company provides 20 million dollars worth of aluminium through the Minerals Commission to local aluminium companies.

Apart from annual support of 50,000 dollars given to the three major universities annually, the company has an annual scholarship scheme for children of Tema Manhean and Kpone. It also organises annual training programmes for teachers of technical schools and polytechnicsMr. Ron Helton, Managing Director of VALCO said the company employs 1,300 workers out of whom only 12 are expatriates, because it believes in technology transfer to enable Ghanaians run the company. There were 182 Americans in 1967.

Mr. Helton corrected misconceptions that VALCO, which currently consumes 25 percent of power generated by VRA, was paying very little for energy, saying the rate is reviewed every five years and it has always gone up.
He said on the contrary, MOZAL, the aluminium smelter in Mozambique pays only one-third of what VALCO pays for electricity.
He said there is pressure on the company to keep production cost low due to competition on the world market in order to make profits. This is because new smelters with the latest technology are producing at the lower costs.