By Charles Takyi-Boadu
The Government says it is confident that sooner than later, foreign investors and businesses will be trooping into the country in droves, to either invest or partner Ghanaian companies to do business.
The Trade and Industry Minister, Ms. Hannah Tetteh, has thus sought to clear doubts being expressed in some quarters about the prudence or otherwise of President Mills' recent trip to the United Kingdom, accompanied by a delegation of some members of his government.
At a press briefing in Accra yesterday, the Minister noted that they were in talks with a lot of foreign investors, and businesses who have not just expressed, but also shown keen interest in coming to invest in the country.
In spite of the global economic effect, she noted, "it was quite clear that Ghana was considered to be a very interesting and exciting business destination, with very good future prospects."
She has thus given Ghanaians her word that they would soon realise the benefits of the President's trip to the UK.
As a first step towards the realisation of this dream, she indicated that the British Minister of State for Trade and Investment, Lord Davies of Abersoch, will be leading a trade delegation to Ghana in September this year, to facilitate the move.
It has thus been agreed that the Minister of Trade and Industry of Ghana would work together with Ghanaian Business Associations to develop a list of UK businesses that the government will like to attract to Ghana, either to invest on their own, or enter into joint ventures with their Ghanaian counterparts in various business sectors.
This is to ensure that Ghana received the maximum benefits from such an investment trip.
Hannah Tetteh gave details of some of the meetings and engagements the government delegation held with some of these prospective investors, stressing that the discussions on investment opportunities were engaging and frank.
According to her, most of the discussions focused on private sector investors.
Over the next few weeks or months, the government says it will be continuing the dialogue to ensure that more of such businesses have the opportunity to join the country do business profitably.During the trip, the Trade and Industry Minister said she and her other colleague Ministers of Finance, had discussions with the UK Department for International Development (DFID) on the issue of private sector development and trade facilitation.
This was in view of an existing private sector development programme, which will come to an end this year.
The programme is a multi-donor supported facility, with DFID being one of the donor partners.
The discussions were thus centered on the renewal of the facility, and the focus areas which the government would like to have addressed in the next phase of the programme.
It was later agreed that the discussion be continued in Accra with the DFID and other development partners, to fashion out a programme that would address the priority areas for private sector investment, as defined by the Mills' administration.
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