Copyright ghanamma
Ghana must, at the soonest possible time, ban or restrict the importation of soaps, toothpaste, toothbrushes, shampoos, toothpicks, and allied products. We need jobs in our country for our own citizens. While the NPP’s One-District-One-Factory and President John Mahama’s 24-Hour Economy are all laudable to an extent, both of these programs are limited in scope and returns. Of course, those only interested in the politics of the Party would invariably throw diatribes my way. Nevertheless, I dare say—how many genuinely sustained jobs resulted from these two programmes? Some might say President Mahama’s “24-Hour Economic Program is still in its infancy”—and it is exactly these apologists, rather than encouraging our political leaders to FORCE themselves into a very serious thinking mood and leapfrog our economy, who have helped us become a stagnant society with very few reaching their potential, because we refuse to expand our national economy beyond the “business as usual.” One of the ways that we can create small-scale manufacturing businesses and create jobs in the process is to BAN the importation of toothpastes, soaps, hair shampoos, toothpicks, and allied products. There is no reason why, after so many decades of independence, Ghana cannot have a LOCAL SOAP MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY owned by Ghanaians. It makes no sense that to this day, we continue to import toothpastes. What is even more annoying is that Ghana imports toothpicks from China, Thailand, Bangladesh, and India. The private sector can do much to reverse the massive exportation of jobs from Ghana, but we cannot do it without our government—at the federal and local level—creating the ENABLING macro-economic environment. This is crucial. INDUSTRY and our ACADEMIA, too, must play their part. If the Government of Ghana plays its part and bans or restricts the importation of soaps, for example, is our industry ready to DEVELOP the best QUALITY soaps—well-formulated, functionally superior products—when compared to the imports? Thank you, and Onyankopong bless you.
