Government, as part of efforts to ensure sustainable economic growth, jobs and income, has drawn up a strategy meant to fully retain all Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) the nation records.
The strategy has brought together regulatory bodies and government agencies which have developed a platform that would solicit and resolve challenges of investors to help support the nation’s economic development infrastructure with increasing volumes of FDI’s.
As a result, the Ghana Investment Promotion Center (GIPC) in collaboration with the Ministry of Information will be holding the debut GIPC Annual Investment Summit, dubbed “Spark Up 2021” to foster investor agency relationships geared at speeding up investment potentials in the country.
The goal of ‘Spark Up’ is to revive the interest of investing in Ghana and to help restore economic growth as the nation emerge from the economic challenges of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaking at the launch of the event, the Chief Executive Officer of GIPC, Yoofi Grant said: “The pandemic is still with us and this calls for innovative ways and strategies to support economic growth, revive businesses and also attract Foreign Direct Investments which is very important for any economy.
Developed or not, FDIs play a critical role in economic growth and there should be a deliberate effort targeted at attracting them. The United States is currently a major attraction of investment, China is arguably the biggest receiver of Foreign Direct Investments, the Emirates with their money is a major destination of FDIs and I believe Ghana can position itself very well to also be a major attraction of FDIs.”
The Minister of Information, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, on his part said that over the years, successive Presidents travel across the world and testify about the country’s favourable economic environment.
He noted that these travels truly attract investors but some challenges impede the nation’s ability to fully onboard all the investment potential. As a result, the ‘Spark Up’ initiative is meant to bridge the gap and offer a platform to deliberate and find ways to further enhance the nation’s business climate to attract and retain more FDIs.
He said: “Access to facilitating services is key to the aim of fully onboarding FDIs. When a business shows interest in the nation and settles to come here, there are other services that are needed to support their operations and make them successful to be able to employ and pay taxes.
Services like water, electricity, district assembly services, commercial banks, insurance, haulage service etc – all these are important for the onboarding of the full FDI amount mentioned by the investor.”
He added that in some instances, community engagements are also very critical for the success of an investor, therefore, a holistic approach would be adopted to make investors feel comfortable.
‘Spark Up’
The summit slated for September 6 will be opened by President of the Republic of Ghana in an opening ceremony. Speakers at the opening ceremony will include the President, the Minister of Finance, Minister of Trade and Industry, the Minister of Information and the Chief Executive of the GIPC, and other high-profile personalities.
FDI data
With the impact of COVID-19, which saw FDIs across the globe suppressed, Ghana’s situation was the opposite with inflows for 2020 experiencing a 139 percent jump – moving from US$1.1billion in 2019 to US$2.65billion, data from the centre has revealed.
A breakdown of the inflows data show that a total of 279 projects were registered within the period, dispersed across eight regions with Greater Accra registering the highest number of 231 projects; and cumulatively, some 27,110 jobs are expected to be generated.
