Carl Nelson – Chief Operating Officer GIPC
The Ghana Investment Promotion Centre and the Ministry of Agriculture have held an event to present to potential investors and agripreneurs investment opportunities availed by the flagship programmes government is promoting.
The Sector Minister, Dr. Owusu Afriyei Akoto, speaking at the ‘Invest in Ghana’ session held on the sidelines of the just ended African Green Revolution Forum (AGRF) on the theme, ‘Investing in Agriculture- Raising Efficiency and Productivity for Economic Growth,’ said agricultural transformation will not take place without the active participation of the private sector.
“Creating the enabling environment for private sector to invest in thriving agribusinesses is the task of government and my government has not relented on this since we took office,” he added.
He said government was focused and committed to turning the fortunes of agriculture in Ghana and this is evident in the flagship programmes to promote technology adoption for increased productivity, value addition and reducing postharvest losses while increasing imports thus creating jobs and increasing incomes.
He said investment opportunities can be found in areas such as storage facilities (34,000 – 250,000mt) at strategic locations to take care of increased production and value addition, commodity exchange to improve trading of agricultural commodities, and investment in mechanization to reduce the drudgery in farming and attract the youth to agriculture.
“The Ghana Incentive Based Risk Sharing Agricultural Lending System (GIRSAL), newly introduced by the Government of Ghana as a de-risking instrument, will enhance bank lending through guaranties and insurance for example.
We would like to tell all potential investors that our doors are open and we are ready to do business with them,” he said.
Chief Operating Officer, GIPC, Carl Nelson, taking participants through the investment potential & opportunities in agriculture, said the government has put in place guarantee against expropriation, custom duty exemption on plant, machinery and equipment and accelerated depreciation for plants and buildings,
“Full repatriation of dividends and net profit attributed to investment, transfer of funds in respect of servicing of foreign loans, transfer of funds after liquidation, and losses carry forward apply to the following businesses,” he said.
He further noted that after the five-year concessionary period (1% for five years from start of operation), agro-processing enterprises which use agricultural raw materials as their main inputs have corporate tax rates fixed according to their location.
The taxes are Accra/Tema, 20 per cent, Other regional capitals (except Northern,Upper East and Upper West regional capitals) 15 per cent , Outside regional capitals 10 per cent, Northern, Upper East and Upper West regions (capitals and all other locations) 5 per cent.
By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri