Local businesses urged to be transparent with operations
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Obibini Blackman Company, Mr Sefah Dankwah, has advised local businesses to be transparent in their business activities in order to attract the right partnership for expansion.
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He said most Ghanaian entrepreneurs were very secretive with their operations such that even their workers knew very little about the operations of the company.
He pointed out that transparency was very crucial to the survival of businesses and ,therefore, urged small and medium- scale enterprises (SMEs) to be transparent in their dealings.
Mr Dankwah said this at a breakfast meeting which was organised by the First Atlantic Bank.
The meeting was on the theme: ‘‘Building SMEs to drive growth and Change in the Economy: a case for partnership.’’
“If you become transparent, you will attract the right people and investors and this will open doors for you,” Mr Dankwah stated.
Access to finance
He said though access to finance was a major challenge for most SMEs, many of them did not need loans to expand but structures to make them expand and be profitable.
He believed that with the right structures and a bit more of openness and transparency, a lot of SMEs would be performing better than they were doing now.
“Typical of Ghanaian businesses, for fear of people stealing his ideas or knowing about the business, many business owners would keep everything to their chest and would be the jack of all trade, thus, not building good structures in place,” he said.
He also noted that most SMEs were unable to access finance from the financial institutions due to their inability to keep good records of their activities.
Support for SMEs
The CEO of First Atlantic Bank, Mr Gabriel Adgal, said the bank had been supporting SMEs with training and capacity building to enable them put structures in place to attract the necessary assistance from financial institutions.
He said the bank had also developed tailored products to meet the needs of specific targets and urged the SMEs to approach the bank for assistance.
According to him, the meeting was to afford the bank the opportunity to know its clients in Kumasi better and also know their needs and how they could work together to meet those needs for the benefit of all.
Government’s assistance
The Director of Industries at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, Mr Kofi Afresah I. Nuhu, for his part, said the government had also been supporting enterprises by helping them to legalise their operations through capacity building and technical assistance.
He said through the Business Advisory Centre (BAC), a lot of the enterprises had been assisted to register their companies and operate as established companies.
That, he said, enabled some of them to get financial assistance from the financial institutions to expand their businesses.