Bono East opens up to investors in agri-business

A day’s strategic business conference aimed at exploring the investment prospects in the Bono East region has taken place in Techiman, the regional capital.

The conference, organised by the Bono East Regional Co-ordinating Council in partnership with the Exim Kingdom Group of Companies, was under the theme: “Tapping into the Investment Opportunities in Bono East.

It was attended by top executives of the Exim Kingdom Group of Companies, Municipal and District Chief Executives in the region, Nananom and a host of others.

Addressing the conference, the CEO of Exim Kingdom Group of Companies, Dr. James Rajamani Gnanaraj, said his outfit is in Ghana not only to make money but also to make positive impacts on the Ghanaian economy through value addition to locally produced food items.

“We have not just come into this country to only make money but our main objective is that we are also to impact this nation through our inputs and as we started, gradually through our strength, we reached this level by the grace of God and also we decided that we are also adding more into this nation”, Dr. Gnanaraj stressed.

Food basket
He said the Bono East region has been chosen as one of the key regions of his company’s operations because it is the food basket of the country, adding that he would facilitate the process of bringing more investors into the region to do business in the near future.

Dr. Gnanaraj stated that taking a cue from the devastating effects of COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine war, there is an urgent need to add value to locally produced goods and services, especially agricultural produce.

This, he further said, will create more jobs, rake in additional revenues and strengthen the supply value chain, and ultimately boost the economy of the country.

He extoled Ghanaians and Africans in general for being peaceful and hospitable and hoped to continue to have an excellent trade relation with the people going forward.

For his part, the Bono East Regional Minister, Kwasi Adu Gyan, said the geographic location and the climatic condition of the region make it an ideal place for massive investment in the area of agriculture, fisheries and aqua-culture.

He announced that members of the Bono East Regional House of Chiefs have wholeheartedly agreed to make land available to prospective investors for the mutual benefit of the region and the investors.

The minister said the region has the potential to be the most preferred destination of agro-processing companies and businesses if particular attention is paid to commercial agriculture through block farming and value addition, saying; “with the needed investment, the region, which has some 44,000 hectares of low valley land, is in the position to produce 400,000 tons of paddy rice during the major season annually.

“This would mean that the Bono East region could play a lead role in drastically reducing the country’s annual importation of rice by nearly 50% while boosting the local economy through value addition and job creation.”

He mentioned soya beans, maize, cassava, ground-nuts, mango, cashew and coconut as some other crops that can be produced in commercial quantities in the region when given the needed push by way of investment.

He said the Bono East region has the potential to annually produce 300,000 tons of soya beans during the minor season, 600,000 tons of maize in the major season, 125,000 tons of ground-nuts, 234,735 metric ton of mango, 112,190 metric tons of cashew and 4,942 metric tons of coconut.

Other members of the delegation from Kingdom Exim Ghana were G.K Krishna, the Trade Commissioner of the Ghana-India Trade Council; Dr. Prasad Passam, Dr. G.R Chintaza, Srini Pavuluru, Dr. Immanuel Paulraj, Samuel Asiamah and Peter Mensah.