The Finance Minister has revealed that government’s plans to set up an Automobile Industry Development Center to oversee the technical affairs of vehicle assemblers and manufacturers in the country.

According to him, this move is to cordinate the affairs of these car manufacturers and to ensure they uphold best practices.

Ken Ofori-Atta stated this while delivering the Mid-year Budget Review in Parliament, Thursday.

“The Center will also coordinate the implementation of a Vehicle Financing Scheme which will link financial institutions to individuals and groups interested in purchasing newly assembled vehicles in Ghana.

"Furthermore, it will manage an Automotive Skills and Technology Upgrading Programme to provide requisite skills for the industry,” he said.

Ofori-Atta further stated that other leading global automobile companies have also shown interest in establishing an assembling base in Ghana.

“Both the Toyota and Nissan Groups are also positioned to establish assemble operations before the end of the year. Sinotruk, a leading global manufacturer of Heavy Duty Trucks is also assembling a variety of trucks in Ghana through Zonda Tec Ghana Limited,” the Finance Minister said.

This development comes after German automobile manufacturer, Volkswagen set up a local assembling point for their cars in the country.

The company rolled out six different brands in their first batch of locally assembled vehicles; Tiguan, Teramont, Amarok, Passat, Polo and Caddy.

The Automotive Manufacturing Development Policy which was rolled out by government is intended to aid the country to become Africa's automobile manufacturing hub.