[ad_1]
Business news for Saturday, November 14, 2020
Source: GNA
2020-11-14
GEPA Deputy Managing Director, Albert Kassim Diwura
Stakeholders from the business fraternity have engaged in the business opportunities and interventions provided by the implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and the National Export Development Strategy (NEDS), at a conference, in Damongo.
The conference was the third in a series of regional events, jointly organized by the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MoTI), the Ghana Export Promotion Authority (GEPA) and the AfCFTA National Coordination Office.
Held on the theme “Empowering Ghanaian Businesses to Reap the Benefits of the AfCFTA Agreement under the NEDS,” the conference brought together relevant stakeholders from the public and private sectors of the Savannah region.
It was to enlighten participants on Ghana’s export development intervention aimed at empowering the private sector to harness the benefits of the AfCFTA to boost the country’s trade with other African countries.
Albert Kassim Diwura, Deputy Executive Director (CEO) of GEPA, offering an overview of the NEDS, said it was in line with Ghana’s industrial transformation agenda towards promoting an export-led economy.
He said the NEDS was a 10-year policy document, targeting the growth of Non-Traditional Exports (NTE) from $ 2.8 billion in 2020 to about $ 25.3 billion in the 10-year period.
He explained that the NEDS would create synergies with the government’s flagship programs, which include; 1 Factory District 1 (1D1F), Planting for Food and Jobs and Planting for Export and Rural Development among others, to ensure the added value of products for export
“Every district in Ghana is expected to develop at least one exportable product that will provide the raw materials needed to feed the growing number of factories being established under (1D 1F),” added Diwura.
Dr. John-Hawkins Asiedu, Technical Advisor, Industrial Parks and Special Economic Zones at MoTI, noted that the AfCFTA agreement would start in January 2021 and said it would expand intra-African trade through better harmonization and coordination of trade within Africa. continent.
He projected that if all 54-member African countries implemented the AfCFTA, there would be an increase in intra-African trade by $ 35 billion per year or 52 percent by 2022.
He explained that the AfCFTA was a single tariff and quota free market covering the entire African continent made up of 55 countries, with a total population of 1.2 billion and a combined GDP of USD 3 trillion.
Iddrisu Sumani, coordinator for FortuneAid Limited, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA), said the engagement had broadened its knowledge base on the initiatives, adding that it would leverage interventions to boost production to increase revenue.
“The commitment has come at the right time and I will encourage everyone to join in and take advantage of the benefits that the AfCFTA and NEDS have for us so that we can collectively achieve the government’s vision of industrial transformation,” he said.
Send your news to
and features for
. Chat with us through WhatsApp at +233 55 2699 625.
