The Minister of Trade and Industry, Alan Kyerematen, has urged Ghana’s Diasporan community to partner local stakeholders to accelerate the nation’s industrialisation process. 

“Ghana cannot succeed in her quest to become an industrialised country without the full support and participation of her Diasporan citizens,” he emphasised. 

“Beyond the remittances you send back home to support your families, Diasporans have increasingly become a great source of capital, creativity, entrepreneurship, technology, and knowledge transfer,” he said.

Mr Kyerematen was speaking at the Ghana Diaspora Public Affairs Collective (GHPAC) inaugural Goldren Gala Awards and Symposium in Washington DC, in the United States of America.

The GHPAC is a nonpartisan, and non-profit social welfare advocacy dedicated to empowering Ghanaians in the Diaspora through civic and political action that can be instrumental in helping Ghana achieve her industrial transformation goal.

The Minister said the government’s strategic approach to harnessing the capabilities and network of Ghanaians in the diaspora was based on a number of considerations, including improving the business environment; enhancing the productive capacity of Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) to produce for both export and local consumption; providing fiscal and non-fiscal incentives for manufacturing; and improving access to foreign markets.

No country had developed without industrialisation, he noted, hence the 10 largest economies in the world – the United States, China, Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, India, France, South Korea, Italy and Canada – were also the most industrialised economies.

The Minister said in pursuit of the strategic objectives, the Government had since the year 2017 been aggressively implementing numerous interventions as part of its Industrial Transformation Agenda aimed at making Ghana the new manufacturing hub for Africa.

These include promoting One District One Factory (1D1F) Initiative; developing new Strategic Anchor Industries aimed at diversifying the Ghanaian economy beyond Cocoa and Gold; and decentralising institutional support for SMEs through the establishment of Business Resource Centres and Business Advisory Centres throughout the country. 

Again, measures had been put in place for the development of Industrial Parks and Special Economic Zones around the country to provide access to industrial lands, dedicated source of electricity, water, telecommunication services , among others, for those interested in going into manufacturing.

Mr Kyerematen noted that, in spite of the current global economic challenges largely occasioned by the joint effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war, the Ghanaian private sector had stood resolute and continued to explore opportunities to expand their frontiers.

He, therefore, urged Ghanaians in the diaspora to partner their counterparts in Ghana to take full advantage of the market opportunities.

“The Government of Ghana will, therefore, continue to provide relevant support and incentives for such partnerships between Ghanaians in Ghana and their counterparts living in the diaspora,” he added.