Ghana Export-Import Bank (GEXIM), an export development financing bank, will construct 100 greenhouses across the country in 2019 under its “Youth In Greenhouse Enterprise Project (YUGEP)”.
The initiative is to promote investment in greenhouse vegetable production, reduce huge and persistent importation of vegetables, as well as create employment within the economy.
The intervention is also an import-substitution strategy to increase the production and yield of vegetable output in the country.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Exim Bank, Mr Lawrence Agyinsam, disclosed this in Accra when he addressed staff at a durbar of the bank at Export Trade House, which houses the head office to outline the bank’s 2019 strategic vision and programmes for the year.
He said for a start, due to vegetation and ecological considerations, six regions, namely, Greater Accra, Ashanti, Central, Western, Volta and Eastern were being considered, adding that, all the necessary stakeholder consultations had been carried out and the necessary procurement process initiated to ensure that the Project commences soon.
Curtailing imports
“It is estimated that about $100 million is spent on vegetable importation into Ghana and this initiative is to help reduce drastically this volume, save foreign exchange and create rural employment in the country,” he stated.
Mr Agyinsam said the bank, in collaboration with the 1D1F Secretariat, would finance 100 community-based industries with GH¢70 million, to boost rural industrialisation and stem the rural-urban drift as well as create the needed employment at the local levels.
“Not only that, we will also establish five legacy projects, including the construction of a jute factory in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region,” he added.
The Exim Bank CEO, therefore, charged the staff of the bank to brace themselves for an action-packed year and contribute their quotas towards the achievement of “Ghana Beyond Aid” programme.
Source: Graphic