The failure of the government New Patriotic Party flagship programme One District One factory (1D1F) to boast domestic production for food sufficiency has make the government to resort to imports restrictions bill of selected 22 items.
The Fellow Chartered Economist (FCE) Economic Adviser Dr. Julius Kattah said this on Adekyee Mu Nsem morning show on Ahotor FM hosted by Citizen Kofi Owusu in Accra.
The trades and import restriction legislative instrument which is before parliament yet to be laid for consideration is receiving a lot of rejection from the business entities, as six business associations, which will be affected by the import restrictions bill, have submitted a petition to Parliament in opposition to the proposed legislative instrument.
The groups under the umbrella name, Joint Business Consultative Forum include the Ghana Union of Traders’ Associations (GUTA), Food and Beverages Association of Ghana (FABAG), Importers and Exporters Association of Ghana, Ghana Institute of Freight Forwarders (GIFF), Chamber of Automobile Dealership Ghana (CADEG), and Ghana National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GNCCI).
He is of the view that, the policy has to operate on of food sufficiency and strong balance of trade’s surplus to discourage smuggling and shortage of essential commodities.
The high taste for foreign products in the country is on high demand, and if care is not taken the policy will not achieved any results, rather it will in turn to create monopolistic culture for few business men and women who are politically inclined to hijack the policy as sole importers of these essential goods.
He is of the view that, since international trade implore relations between countries in all kinds of goods and services and it’s unlikely will leads to revenue down turn, low wealth creation development, which can leads to high inflation into the economy.
Going forward the policy on trade restrictions cannot bring any economic benefits, since our economy is not strong enough to adopt the policy, in production of the high demand of the goods we need for consumption.
In another development, the trades’ policy will lower the income of street hawkers and create unemployment if there is a shortage of these commodities which they will have a source of supply to sale. This can leads to smuggling and other social vices.
The Fellow Chartered Economist Dr. Julius Kattah, (FCE) Economic Adviser, opined that, strategically some industries will suffer and some industries will benefits since there is not going to be fairness in the trade policy the NPP government is about to implement.
AYM Kukah. E:mail:kukahalexander7@gmail.com
