President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo was very smart in conceiving the idea to establish one factory in each of the 216 districts across the country, as well as the idea of creating one dam per village in the three regions in the North, Dr Emmanuel Asiedu, Executive Director of the Gratis Foundation, an agency under the Ministry of Trade and Industry, has said.
The New Patriotic Party (NPP) led by Mr Akufo-Addo made the promise to create these facilities as well as the one million dollars per constituency, ahead of the 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections, an election the NPP won.
The government, through the Minister-designate for Trade, Alan Kyerematen, has reiterated its commitment at fulfilling these promises as a way of creating more jobs for the Ghanaian youth. Mr Kyerematen made the commitment when he appeared before the Appointments Committee of parliament for his vetting on Monday January 23.
Speaking on this matter in an interview with Chief Jerry Forson on Ghana Yensom on Accra100.5FM, Mr Asiedu said: “For the first six months of [2017], we should expect to see something with the One District One Factory, at least one factory will be okay. In my own estimation if we get the money we should be able to do at least 50 of them.
“I like Nana’s idea, I always say this man is wise with how he came round to this idea of one million dollars per constituency and the One District One Dam to promote irrigation farming
“I will suggest that every district have 40 to 50 per cent of the one million dollars to support farming and that should go hand-in-hand with provision of the dam so that farming could go on throughout the year. If we depend on rain-fed agriculture, the produce will stop coming at a point.
“For the factories to be sustainable we need to make the workers part owners of the factories, they should be shareholders in the factory, and so if you are a worker, my proposal is that we should set aside 10 per cent of your salary so that you become a shareholder in the factory.
“The suppliers of the raw materials should also be made shareholders and so if the worker there is a shareholder and the suppliers are also shareholders, the factories will continue operating.”
Source: Ghana/AccraFM.com
