AGRO-BASED INDUSTRIALISATION TO PROPEL COUNTRY TO MID-INCOME STATUS (PAGE 31, DEC 2)

THE Director of Small and Medium Scale Enterprise (SME) and Technology at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, Mr Johnson Adasi, has said the government’s strategy of stimulating significant growth to achieve middle-income economy is largely expected to occur through agro-based industrialisation led by the private sector.
He indicated that experiences from the rapidly emerging economies of the world attested to the fact that while the development of agriculture, manufacturing and services in sequence created a sustainable momentum for growth the primary value to drive this purpose was absent.
Mr Adasi made the remarks at the relaunch of Process Foods and Spices Limited, also known as SAMBA FOODS in Tema.
He expressed regret that Ghana, as a country, had not been able to implement extensive and comprehensive reforms that could transform the macro-economy, investment climate, legal and regulatory environment.
He said in order to re-position Ghana on a solid trail for industrial growth, the country needed to redefine the above mentioned factors.
The Zimbabwean Ambassador to Ghana, Mrs Pavelyn Musaka, noted that the development agenda of a nation lay in agriculture and industrialisation, and challenged policy makers to move away from paying lip-service and rather take progressive decisions that could help improve the lives of the ordinary people in society.
The Chief Executive of SAMBA Foods, Mrs Leticia Osafo-Addo, said lack of finance, subversion and diversion of fund-loans, inadequate managerial skills and the lack of ready market for locally made products were the stiff challenges that impeded the growth of local industries.
She indicated that her outfit, in spite of these challenges, rose above the storm and expanded until insufficient cash flow hit them following the failure of a governmental agency, their major client, to pay for goods supplied to it for almost two years, leading to a partial closure of the factory.
She expressed regret that although government after government preached the gospel of private-public sector partnership, the same entities were doing very little to rescue agro-based companies that ran into problems.
Mrs Osafo-Addo said the resuscitation of her factory from a long slumber should serve as a test case for small-scale businesses, and challenged managers of such entities to remain focused.
She appealed to the government to provide regulations at the macro-level that would motivate financial institutions which were the major financiers of business projects to develop better relationships with small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) thereby complementing their efforts at developing the country.
She also called for an intervention by the Ghana Standards Board, Food and Drugs Board, Food Science Department and other stakeholders in order to make black pepper, ‘Shito’ a national product that could be identified with Ghana when it was mentioned; just as Mercedes Benz was linked to Germany.
The immediate past President of the Association of Ghana Industries, Mr Oteng Gyasi, expressed regret that SMEs in agro-business, which were supposed to spearhead the country’s development agenda, had been relegated to the background and called for collaborative efforts by stakeholders to reverse the trend.
Chief Executive Officer of GhanaMade, Mrs Comfort Aniagyei, who are the marketers of SAMBA products, called on Ghanaians to develop a passion for the consumption of made-in-Ghana products since that was the needed catalyst for the achievement of the country’s development goals.