President Akufo-Addo
President Akufo-Addo has reiterated government’s commitment to creating more job opportunities in the coming years.
“We are working to put in place measures to ensure that we take full advantage of the US market through the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) initiative,” he said.
He disclosed this during the launch of the Ghana Apparel Manufacturing Expansion project under the Global Alliance (GAME-GDA) at Adjabeng Free Zones enclave in Accra yesterday.
GAME-GDA is a cooperative agreement between the USAID and Dignity DTRT Limited to provide training for not less than 1,337 people and create 1,187 new apparel-making jobs.
Almost 80% of the jobs are expected to go to women, many of whom lack skills and come from low income backgrounds, with a number of them being out-of-school adolescents.
The new partnership is also expected to increase new apparel exports from Ghana to the US; duty and quota free under AGOA.
Ghana’s total exports under AGOA in the year 2016 amounted to some $12 million.
But President Akufo-Addo indicated that“we aim at increasing our export volumes under AGOA to $500 million.”
This, according to the President, would create thousands of jobs, saying “the target is ambitious, but certainly achievable.”
He described Dignity DTRT Limited as a key part of the important operation.
“It is expected to contribute some $82 million out of this amount.”
That, he said, falls within the overall vision of making the textile and garment industry strategic for Ghanaian industrialization.
He hinted that “government is in the process of finalizing our new AGOA export strategy and action plan.”
The DTRT group is touted as West Africa’s largest apparel manufacturer and exporter.
It currently employs more than 1, 600 skilled employees, with 75% of them, mostly women from the streets and low income households.
The company is said to produce well over 25,000 shirts daily and has exported more than 6 million garments in the past 24 months to the US under AGOA.
It is 51% owned by Dignity Industries, a wholly Ghanaian-owned company and 49% by DTRT Apparel Limited, a Ghanaian registered company with US ownership with offices in San Diego, California.
The partnership started in 2014 with 145 sewing machines, and has the capacity to expand to employ 3,000 workers in the next year.
US Ambassador to Ghana, Robert P. Jackson, on his part said, “We are pleased to support Dignity/DTRT’s expansion which will create jobs and result in the expansion of DTRT’s AGOA eligible exports from Ghana by at least $20 million annually.”
By Charles Takyi-Boadu, Presidential Correspondent