New procurement law to emphasise local content
The revised Procurement Act is to ensure that indigenes and their businesses get the opportunity to benefit fully from the economic prospects of the country, the Minster of Trade and Industry, Hon Haruna Iddrisu, has hinted.
The review, he said, would make it mandatory for public institutions to include local content as a key factor in the bidding for and winning of contracts from the government.
Once the process was concluded, the minister said, government contracts would then be won by companies that had showed “clear signs of commitment” to local
New procurement law to emphasise local content
The minister gave the hint at the opening ceremony of the 4th AGI Local Content Exhibition and Conference in Accra.
This exhibition and conference is an annual initiative by the AGI, which is the umbrella body of manufacturing and related businesses, to help engage public and private stakeholders on how local content – the inclusion of local raw materials and indigenous enterprises in key sectors of the economy – can be achieved.
It was initiated in 2009 and had since gained the support of the Ministries of Trade and Industry, Lands and Natural Resources, Water Resources, Works and Housing and Energy and Petroleum in addition to some key players in the extractive and allied sectors.
This year’s event was on the theme: ‘Making Local Content Work,’’ which ran from October 21-24 during which institutions in the mining and quarry, oil and gas and their allied services exhibited their works in local content to participants. There were also conferences on local content where institutions such as the Ghana Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Petroleum Commission (PC), and Tullow Ghana, among others, took turns to address the subject.
Hon Haruna, who was the guest of honour at the opening ceremony, said government’s commitment to local content policy was not only through legislations but policies that were backed by actions.
“For us as a government, we consider local content as a political commitment and a moral imperative to the people of this country and that is what we are working at achieving,” the minister said.
He thus called on members of the AGI and the business community in general to build expertise and capacity needed to take full advantage of the environment being created by the government through the various local content policies and legislations.
The Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Hon Collins Dauda, recounted a situation where he was once served with fufu, a local dish made of pounded yam and cassava, by a white person in his constituency and when he enquired, he was told that the caterer was a South African.
“And so that caterer employed a white person, who served me fufu in my constituency. Since then, the issue of local content has been very relevant to me more than ever,” the minister said.
He also pledged his ministry’s commitment to the issue but further charged indigenous businesses and Ghanaians in general to be well-equipped to participate in all aspects of the country’s economic activity.
Source: Maxwell Adombila Akalaare/Daily Graphic
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