Kwesi Pratt Jnr. has urged authorities to supply another help for native companies and farmers earlier than implementing its restrictions on meals imports into the nation.
A invoice has been laid earlier than Parliament to legislate the importation of meals commodities by imposing restrictions on it.
The Minister of Trade, Kobina Tahir Hammond, is pushing for this laws believing it’s a answer to the decline of native companies and the cedi depreciation.
When the invoice is enacted, meals commodities equivalent to rice, fruit juice, margarine, cement, fish, sugar and 16 different merchandise that the federal government phrases “strategic products” will probably be affected by the restrictions.
But six enterprise associations comprising the Ghana Union of Traders Associations (GUTA), Importers and Exporters Association of Ghana, Food and Beverages Association of Ghana (FABAG), Ghana Institute of Freight Forwarders (GIFF), Chamber of Automobile Dealership Ghana (CADEG) and Ghana National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GNCCI) have vehemently kicked towards the invoice.
They outlined their considerations in a petition to Parliament asking the House to reject the invoice.
The associations argue that the imports restriction “will eventually lead to monopolistic or oligopolistic position for a few select business in the country at the expense of many smaller businesses. The permit will definitely hinder the flow of goods from exporting countries to receivers in Ghana since importers would no longer be able on market demands to dictate the quantities to be ordered as companies will be at the whims of the Minister of Trade and Industry”.
Discussing the difficulty, the seasoned Journalist, Kwesi Pratt Jnr. admitted regulating meals imports is a proper name, nonetheless, the federal government will probably be punishing native companies and people ought to the restrictions be imposed now.
He defined that native manufacturing is just not on par with international imports, therefore this laws may have detrimental results on Ghanaians, so challenged authorities to first provoke measures that enhance native manufacturing.
“The motive is not wrong but if you take something like rice, comparing the rice we consume in this country to those imported from abroad, ours is not up to even 50%. So, as we currently haven’t made arrangements to grow sufficient rice for us, bringing these measures is a punishment because the purchasing price will be expensive. Therefore, before this regulation comes into force, we should have rolled out measures to grow what we can eat, sow what we can wear and drink our own water,” he mentioned on Peace FM’s “Kokrokoo” present Tuesday morning.
Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana
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