Trade Minister tours Olam factories
The Minister of Trade and Industry, Mr Haruna Idrissu, has said the government may in future consider taking measures to discourage the importation of flour into the country in order to reinforce local production.
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The minister made the comment at the end of a familiarisation tour of Olam’s wheat mill at Kpone, near Tema, which produces 500 metric tonnes per day.
“It is too early to impose an administrative ban on these imports now, but in the long term we will need to access whether local manufacturers have the capacity to meet local demand and consumption of flour; once that is established, government will take steps to discourage the importation of flour into the country and encourage the use of what is produced here locally,” Mr Idrissu said.
He stressed that if local producers of flour showed a strong capacity to meet local demand, some cost benefit analysis would have to be done on the pricing of imported flour as against flour produced by local manufacturers, and that if the price of locally manufactured flour proved favourable the government would adopt the necessary strategies to protect local producers.
The Olam Wheat Mill is a US$ 55 million investment inaugurated in February, 2012. It employs some 200 workers and produces six brands.
After being conducted through the various milling processes and the quality control regimes of the mill, the minister said he was highly impressed with the employment opportunities offered to Ghanaians by the factory, and by the fact that wheat was being produced locally by a local manufacturer instead of being imported.
The minister also visited Olam’s tomato paste factory which employs over 250 Ghanaians.
Mr Idrissu appealed to the management of Olam to work with the government and the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to explore the possibility of developing local tomato varieties for processing.
He stressed that it was essential that all manufacturers endeavoured to maintain acceptable quality standards, and that exporters especially must comply strictly with the minimum standards set by the Ghana Standards Authority so that Ghanaian exports might have ‘an easy flow’ into the international market.
The Managing Director of Olam Ghana, Mr Amit Agrawal, said Olam was extremely proud of its investments in the Ghanaian economy.
“We are happy that the government acknowledges the contributions of Olam’s investments, particularly in the context of local employment generation and value addition. We look forward to continued support from the government to make the manufacturing sector viable, thereby encouraging Olam to continue to invest more in the Ghanaian economy,” Mr Agrawal said.