Government has engaged multinational Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) organisations in the country and is on the verge of introducing incentives that will enable them to expand while attracting more investments, according to Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, Minister of Information.
BPO is a subset of outsourcing that involves contracting the operations and responsibilities of a specific business process to a third-party service provider, especially customer-care relations of manufacturing firms. In recent times, BPO has skyrocketed as firms chase cheap labour and affordable infrastructure in Africa.
The information minister made this revelation in an interview with media on the side-lines of an end of year staff durbar organised by Concentrix + Webhelp in Accra.
He mentioned that investment in basic infrastructure over the years, especially in digital technology and skills development, is enabling an ecosystem that makes it possible for BPOs to operate in Ghana; and this has been an attraction point to most multinational organisations that want to set up on the continent, hence the need for incentives.
The information minister stressed that some of these organisations have employed over 500 Ghanaian youth in a period of just over one year, but certain challenges are impacting their expansion plans negatively.
To help them expand and create more opportunities, he hinted, government is considering incentives such as tax-waivers. “The basic economic infrastructure in addition to political stability and improving macroeconomic stability condition is giving confidence to businesses in the BPO space to set up in Ghana, and what we now need to do is provide specific incentives that will make it easier to set up and operate.
“Our engagement with the BPOs is to seek first-hand the type of incentives they require – and top of the list is affordable infrastructure, Internet speed and some fiscal incentives that will make it easier compared to competitor nations; and so, we are working around these areas,” he said.
However, he mentioned that the incentives will be on a case-by-case basis considering specific needs of the particular companies.
Touching on other competitive advantages that the country has over its neighbours in the sub-region, he reiterated that Ghana is in a good time-zone, has a widely spoken international language and a youthful population with top-notch skills in technology and digitalisation.
This, coupled with tax incentives, affordable infrastructure, high-speed accessible Internet and cheaper power, he said, will attract more players into the space to create employment in high quantities – just as Concentrix + Webhelp is doing.
Key role of BPO
Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) refers to the process of contracting standard business functions to another party outside a company. Those in the BPO industry can provide this support thanks to their strong understanding of organisational processes that are similar across most companies.
BPO enables an organisation to focus more of its resources on operations that distinguish it in the marketplace.
