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26.11.2008 Business & Finance

Establish Handicraft Centres - Aburihene

26.11.2008 LISTEN
By Our Reporter - newtimesonline.com

Aburihene Nana Otubour Djan Kwasi II, has appealed to the government to set-up handicraft centres in the regions to boost the country's economy.

The chief said talents of handicraft can be unearthed from the nation's human resources only if the necessary structures are put in place.

The Aburihene made the appeal at a seminar held at Aburi to find out the challenges in the handicraft industry and solutions to salvage the drastic decline of the export of the products of the industry.

Themed “Growing the Handicraft Industry for Export” the workshop was funded by the Export Development and Investment Fund (EDIF).

Nana Djan Kwasi said Aburi is a place that abounds in handicraft talents and therefore urged the authorities to assist the town to grow the handicraft industry to earn more foreign exchange for the country.  

Mr Collins Boateng, Executive Secretary of the Ghana Export Promotion Council (GEPC), said statistics indicate that export of handicraft products between the year 2000 and 2007 earned the sector $59.656 million.

He described the figure as low and said it was due to China's vigorous competition with Ghana on the assorted handicrafts with new designs, excellent finishing and lower prices in basketry and statues products.

Mr Maxwell Kusi, Marketing Research Manager of GEPC, said other factors that accounted for the decline was the minimal design and quality gap between craft products in the low and middle segments of the markets.

He said emerging business trends had changed to on-line transaction and handicraft from Ghana had not yet adopted this new trend.

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