Ghana to hold Trade and Investment
Exhibition in London
Ho CEPS
to collect 6.4 trillion cedis as revenue target
Ghanaian Entrepreneurs advised to
enter into partnerships
Ghana observes day at ECOWAS Fair
Ghana to hold Trade and Investment
Exhibition in London
Accra (Greater Accra) 10 March 2003- Ghana is to
hold a trade and investment exhibition dubbed Ghana Expo 2003 in London to
showcase Ghanaian products and investment opportunities.
The exhibition, to be held from 15 to 18 October
2003, is under the auspices of the Office of the President and Ministry of
Trade and Industry in collaboration with the British High Commission and
members of the Private Enterprise Foundation.
It will be launched at the La Palm Royal Beach
Hotel on 4 April 2003 and also at the Royal National Hotel, Russell Square,
London, on 21 Friday 2003. A statement made available to the Ghana News Agency
said the Expo would draw thousands of visitors to sample the best of
made-in-Ghana products and explore opportunities for investment.
"It will also provide the avenue for Ghanaian
entrepreneurs to meet their counterparts one to one from European, African,
Asian and American business communities." The exhibition seeks to
establish Ghana as a reliable source of supply of raw materials, finished
products and quality labour.
The subject areas to be covered are
agro-processing, transportation, mining, non-traditional exports, fine
jewellery, ceramics, textiles, energy, power garments and financial services.
There will be a series of business meetings to
address issues such as Ghana, the Gateway to West Africa; Investment
guarantees; Investment Incentives; the Internet-Development Growth and its
Future Potential in Ghana; The Free Zones and Ghana as a major re-export hub
for the West African Sub-region.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Accra (Greater Accra) 10 March 2003-
PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC), a major financial management powerhouse has urged
government to stick to its plan of not borrowing from the domestic market to
finance budget deficit.
This advice must be heeded if government intends to
achieve its ambitious macroeconomic targets and policy initiatives. In an
overall commentary on the 2003 budget made available to the Ghana News Agency
(GNA) Business Desk in Accra, it said government must also aim to control
expenditure within normal resources while accelerating the divestiture
programme to obtain the much-needed receipts to support planned expenditure and
meet the relevant conditionalities to attract additional HIPC funds.
Government macroeconomic targets for 2003 are to
meet a real GDP growth of at least 4.7 percent, an end of year inflation rate
of 9.0 percent and an overall budget deficit equivalent to 3.6 per cent of GDP.
It also hopes to hit a domestic primary budget
surplus of 3.0 percent of GDP and gross official reserve holdings equivalent to
2.3 months of imports of goods and services.
PWC noted that external factors such as the threat
of war in Iraq, possible increases in oil prices and the continuation of the
Ivorian crisis have a significant effect on efforts to achieve the goals and
must be managed with tact.
PWC welcomed the pragmatic policies that government
has proposed in infrastructure, agriculture and social services. "It is
interesting to note that agriculture is receiving the necessary attention and
will lead to increasing the import duties on poultry and rice while providing
resources and incentives to local farmers to grow more."
On the introduction of a national long-term savings
scheme, PWC said, "It is long overdue, saying the major challenge to the structural
policies is government's ability to implement these initiatives."
It said government is clear on the importance of
the development of the finance industry to develop adding that, the
privatisation programme, which virtually grounded to a halt, needs to be
re-energized and completed.
"The capital markets," PWC said, "
will certainly obtain a significant boost if government's shares in the 10
companies are floated on the Ghana Stock Exchange." PWC commended
government for keeping within its actual expenditure for 2002 fall within the
projected figure for that year and said Ghana must expect increased revenue
from petroleum levy in real terms by about 47 percent following the 95 percent
increase in petroleum prices.
"The budgeted indirect tax of 24.8 percent of
the total revenue of 21,347 billion cedis, appears static and asked government
to put in place measures to broaden the tax base in order to optimise revenue
from taxes."
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Ho CEPS to collect 6.4 trillion cedis
as revenue target
Ho (Volta Region) 10 March 2003- Customs Excise and
Preventive Service (CEPS) is to collect 6.4 trillion cedis as revenue this
year, Mr Samuel Afari-Aikins, acting Assistant Commissioner of CEPS for Ho
sector said on Saturday.
Addressing members of the senior staff association
after the annual national endurance walk said the figure represents 150 percent
of the 4.7 trillion cedis collected last year.
He said the sterling qualities exhibited in the
2002 annual revenue target could not have been achieved if the personnel were
unhealthy. The walk was under the theme, "A Healthy Senior Officer-an
Efficient Supervisor" and was aimed at promoting fitness and discipline
among senior Officers in a spirit of friendship and co-operation.
Afari-Aikins said an expanded health-care, which
has been formulated into a general welfare package, is currently before the
CEPS Board for approval. He said the success of the Service, therefore, hinges
on the health of the personnel and was optimistic that regular exercises would
be sustained and not limited to the annual sports festivals and endurance walk
alone.
He said the human body reaches its peak performance
at age 35 before beginning its downward decline and advised the personnel
against attitudes, which would inhibit the development of their health.
Afari-Aikins commended officers and men of the
other security and revenue services in Ho for their solidarity during the
exercise. Christopher Laweh, Chairman of the national senior staff association
said the walk would remain in the CEPS calendar because of its health value to
the personnel.
He regretted that the Minister of Finance did not
commend the staff of the service during his budget statement to parliament,
saying this has somehow affected morale.
Winners were presented with prizes ranging from
ghetto blasters, burners, wristwatches, wax prints and certificates. Forty-two
others also received consolation prizes.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Ghanaian Entrepreneurs advised to enter
into partnerships
Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 10 March 2003- Ghanaian
Entrepreneurs have been called upon to move away from operating their
businesses single-handedly and begin to enter into partnerships with other
entrepreneurs
Opoku-Agyemang Prempeh, Executive-President of the
Centre for Moral Education (CEMED), a Kumasi-based non-governmental
organisation (NGO), which focuses on the promotion of good moral values, said
until Ghanaian indigenous entrepreneurs accepted to partner with each other, it
would be very difficult for them to make any positive impact on the national
economy.
Prempeh made the call at the opening session of a
two-day peer education workshop on HIV/AIDS held in Kumasi at the weekend. The
workshop, which was organised by the CEMED for selected members of the virgin
clubs in the Ashanti Region, was designed to further enlighten the participants
on the dangers of the AIDS pandemic to enable them in turn to go back to their
localities to also educate their peers about it.
It was also used as an avenue to instil in the
participants basic skills for undertaking small-scale businesses Mr Prempeh
blamed the inability of indigenous entrepreneurs to compete effectively with
their foreign counterparts in production and marketing of products to the
failure of local entrepreneurs to form co-operatives and pool resources to
enter into partnerships.
"Their efforts at adding value to products and
penetrating the global market will remain an illusion if they continued to
operate as one-man business or as sole proprietorships", he observed.
Prempeh also called on the Government to show a
more practical concern for the development of local industries by making credit
facilities easily accessible to them He suggested that as part of measures to
help local industries to function smoothly, government should set up a
mechanism to deal directly with local entrepreneurs in the disbursement of
financial assistance to them.
Prempeh said dealing with such industrial concerns
directly was crucial to their effective performance since "sourcing funds
from the financial institutions was not only laborious and full of bureaucratic
bottlenecks but also frustrating".
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Ghana observes day at ECOWAS Fair
A A Blay& Dominic Adoboli, GNA Correspondents,
Lome
Lome (Togo) 10 March 2003-Ghana has called on the
ECOWAS Secretariat to help strengthen the capacity of member countries to
negotiate international economic trade agreements with the industrialised
world.
ECOWAS should also be in a position to foster
collaboration of member states for a common position in negotiations between
the African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries and the European Union (EU)
partnership agreement.
Speaking at the Ghana Day at the 10-day, third
ECOWAS Trade Fair in Lome, Togo at the weekend the Minister of Trade and
Industry, Dr Kofi Konadu Apraku said the organisation should propel countries
of the West Africa Sub-Region to adopt a common position in negotiating with
the World Trade Organisation (WTO) on the Daho Development Agenda.
Dr Apraku said the immediate aim of the Ghana
government was to stabilise the country's macro economy through reducing
inflation, interest rate and stabilising the cedi.
He stressed Ghana's commitment to the principles
and objectives of ECOWAS and improving its trade within the Sub-Region. He said
available statistics showed that in 2001 Ghana's share of total non-traditional
exports in West Africa was 26 per cent.
The Trade and Industry Minister said in 2002 this
increased to 28 per cent while the projection for this year (2003) was 35 per
cent. He noted that Ghana could only achieve this target through the removal of
barriers to trade in the Sub-Region.
Dr Apraku said; "we need to ensure that ECOWAS
Trade Liberalisation Scheme (ELTS) worked to enable West Africa businesses gain
greater access to markets of member states."
He pointed out that this could only be achieved through the creation of a harmonious Tariffs and Customs Union of the Sub-Region. Dr Apraku called for strengthening of ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development (EBID) to provide capital for the development and modernisation of industries.
The Togolese Minister of Trade, Commerce Transport
and Free Zones Development, Drama Dramani, stressed the need for good
neighbourliness among ECOWAS countries.
He said such relations were necessary if ECOWAS
were to achieve its aim of integrating the economies of member states to create
a larger market for business in the Sub-Region.
Dramani noted that this was the only way ECOWAS
members could be competitive in a global world economy. He called for the
deepening of co-operation between Ghana and Togo for the mutual benefits of
their peoples.
The Ghana and ECOWAS flags were hoisted in a
flag-raising ceremony on the forecourt of the Trade Fair Centre on Saturday.
Present at the ceremony were officials of the ECOWAS Secretariat, Ghana's
Ambassador to Togo, Mr Kwabena Mensah-Bonsu, Mrs Esther Ofori, Chief Executive
Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Trade Fair Authority and Ghanaian and International
Exhibitors at the fair.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com