The Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) has asked vehicle dealers and importers to gird their loins for the implementation of the pre-shipment inspection and vehicle age verification (PVoC) programme for imported used vehicles, which takes effect from October 1, this year.
The PVoC is meant to prevent the importation of substandard and unsafe vehicles, ensure compliance with Ghana's safety and environmental requirements and improve traceability of imported vehicles.
The overall objective of the policy is to sanitise the automotive industry through the enforcement of standards, testing, certification and surveillance, ensuring that every vehicle coming into Ghana is inspected from the country of origin.
The Director-General of the GSA, Professor George Agyei, explained to the Daily Graphic that when the programme kicks off, any vehicle coming into the country must first be taken to a licensed vehicle pre-inspection company at the country of origin for inspection and a conformity certificate before it is imported.
"So, from October 1 this year, we can know where every vehicle is coming from in the world because the vehicle will be inspected and given a certificate, a sticker and a report.
Potential buyers can ask for a PVoC report on the vehicle, which gives vital information on ownership of the car, accident status and mileage,” he said.
Current situation
Ghana currently has about four million registered vehicles with the Driver and Vehicle Licencing Authority (DVLA).
Of these, 10 per cent are new, while 90 per cent are used cars.
The country’s import market for used vehicles is a critical component of the national transport ecosystem, with over 100,000 used vehicles imported annually (2024 estimate).
Regarding revenue loss and customs evasion, there are issues with under-invoicing, misclassification of vehicles, age misrepresentation, and customs duty leakages, with an estimated annual loss of between $50 million and $100 million.
The health and safety issues arise from the importation of accident- or damage-affected vehicles without proper disclosure of whether they are flood-damaged cars; whether they have structural integrity issues or whether their emissions compliance exceeds the country’s emission standards.
Consumer fraud and exploitation also manifest through odometer tampering, leading to suspected mileage fraud; hidden accident history; an influx of stolen vehicles (international theft rings using Ghana as a destination) and consumer financial loss, estimated at up to $5,000 per defrauded buyer.
Overhaul
The GSA director-general explained that the government was implementing the PVoC reform to address those challenges.
The reform involves immediate regulation of the quality of vehicles and parts; the country’s automotive value chain — certification, manufacturing, repair, servicing and disposal and the automobile marketplace, including recognised vehicle importers, certified garages, financing schemes and trading platforms.
The reform aligned with the GSA Act, 2022 (Act 1078), which has the objective to “establish, promulgate and maintain standards to ensure high quality of goods and services that are produced or procured in the country for local consumption and for export or imported for local consumption.”
VEDIS
Prof. Agyei said under the new policy, a Vehicle Dealership Information System (VEDIS) had been created to host all the relevant stakeholders in the vehicle importation ecosystem.
“The platform will help the GSA to know which vehicles are stolen or not. It will have on board the Economic and Organised Crimes Organisation (EOCO), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Interpol and the security agencies of the respective countries.
The security agencies of the various countries will know stolen vehicles and block their importation and this will help to eliminate or reduce stolen vehicle importation,” he explained.
He added that the VEDIS platform would ensure vehicle security and mitigate theft because it would use a cross-referenced Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) to determine whether a vehicle was stolen.
