Govt Business Team Tours US

The Ghana Embassy in Washington in conjunction with the US Chamber of Commerce and the Whitaker Group is facilitating a major investment promotion tour of the West Coast of the US, from April 16 to 21, 2007.

The Ghana team, which will be actively involved in the four-day tour, includes Mr Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu, Minister for Finance and Economic Planning; Mr Alan Kyeremanten, Minister for Trade, Industry, Private Sector Development and President's Special Initiatives and Dr Kwame Bawuah Edusei, Ghana's Ambassador to the US.

The purpose of the tour is to explore new business opportunities and promote partnership between small-and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) in some African countries, including Ghana and US companies.

The tour is also to serve as a prelude to the upcoming AGOA Forum that is scheduled to take place in Accra from July 16-19, 2007.

The objective of the investment promotion tour falls directly in line with government's agenda of not only establishing the necessary bilateral economic liaisons, but also creating a favourable environment to facilitate increased inflows of foreign direct investment as well as viable partnership for the growth of Ghanaian SMEs, which constitute a crucial part of the private sector.

The four-day ministerial tour will provide a rare business promotion opportunity to a selected group of African ministers and government officials. The delegation will pay visits to major US businesses in different sectors including apparel, information and communication technology (ICT), financial services and infrastructure.

The delegation will also have the opportunity to hold business networking sessions.

The first port of call by the delegation will be Seattle, in Washington State and then onwards to San Francisco and San Jose, in the State of California.

In Seattle, highlights of the activities include site visits and meeting with officials of Boeing Company, Starbucks Company and Bill Gates Foundation.