Public and private sector institutions must prioritise effective and prudent stores and inventory management to tackle revenue leakages, prolong the lifespan of procured goods and promote value-based procurement, astute procurement expert and Chief Executive Officer of Prosupp Consult, Collins Agyemang Sarpong, has advised.

Speaking to journalists on the sidelines of a three-day training workshop on stores and inventory management in Accra, he said that the absence of an effective management culture for goods in stores was costing businesses huge sums of money.

“A lot of companies are losing money because of this lack of empowerment on prudent stores/inventory management.

This gap between when goods are sourced and disposed of leads to huge losses to both public and private organisations, and this raises concerns about value-based procurement,” he shared.

According to the renowned procurement expert, most institutions underestimate the fact that items procured and kept in stores are money in the form of assets and therefore fail to adopt the right practices in managing their stores.

Mr Sarpong also spotlighted the absence of modern legislation governing the efficient and prudent management of stocks in various organisations, adding that existing law, which is the Stores Regulation 1984, was archaic and not fit for purpose.

“Even the Procurement Act 663 does not clearly show how stores and inventory should be managed; it has all the provisions for acquiring the goods and how to dispose of them, but jumps how to manage the stocks in the stores,” he further argued.

The procurement expert therefore implored private businesses and public institutions to empower their stores and inventory officers through continuous development training to cut down on wastages and save cost.

The three-day workshop, organised by the multidisciplinary professional procurement consultancy firm ProSupp Consult, equipped senior and top-level procurement and supply chain practitioners with the requisite skills to manage inventories through the cycle, from purchase, prudent management through the lifespan and effective disposal.

Mr Sarpong said that the training workshop was done based on the procurement law, which gives detailed processes of how procurement should be done, but skips how sourced items or stores should be managed.

“Through this training, stores and inventory as well as procurement practitioners have been empowered to prudently manage and add value to items that are bought in their respective organisations, both in the public and private sectors,” he added.

Over 70 participants drawn from public and private sector institutions across the country were empowered with core inventory management skills in the science of stock levels, efficient warehousing management,t as well as the various costs and risks associated with inventory management.

Mr. Godwin Owusu, a participant from ARB Apex Bank, said that the workshop was highly impactful: “I have learned different types of classification of inventory and how to keep our stores clean and properly organised as a store and inventory professional. I will recommend this training to my peers because I think it will help most organisations.

Another participant from the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, Stella Abena Oforiwaa, shared her experience: This training has been very effective; I have learned so many new things which I’m going to implement at my workplace, especially how to prepare adequately before stock-taking and producing good reports.