More projects registered

Accra, Dec 24, GNA - The Ghana Investment Promotion Centre on Friday said it registered 48 projects during the third quarter of 2004 with initial Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inflows yielding 5.37 million dollars.

The FDI inflow is 25.2 per cent more than the 4.29 million dollars recorded in the second quarter in which 47 projects were registered. In addition, one Technology Transfer Agreement (a Management Contract) in the construction sector was signed during the period. Statistics on registered projects made available to the Ghana News Agency indicated that total initial equity capital attracted during the first three quarters of the year under review was US$16.05milliion compared with US$12.9 million and US$12.94 million for all the four quarters of 2001 and 2002 respectively.

Indications are, however, that 2004 figure would be lower than the figure of US$38.12 million for year 2003. The high figure for year 2003 was due to an equity investment of US$21.03 million by Societ=E9 G=E9n=E9rale in Social Security Bank (SSB).

Manufacturing and the Service sectors continued to be the leading sectors receiving FDI and it is in line with the World Investment Report Year 2003 published by UNCTAD which showed a global shift of FDI for the Service industry.

Between January and September 2004, 40 projects in the manufacturing sector valued at US$24.59 million were registered while 28 projects were registered in the service sector involving an estimated capital outlay of US$29million.

As at the end of September 2004, India had the highest number of 67 registered projects in the Manufacturing Sector, followed by China with 49 projects. Lebanon occupied the third position with 47 projects. In a similar manner Great Britain had the highest number of 66 registered projects in the Service Sector followed by the USA with 53 projects. Germany occupied the third position with 36 projects With respect to the 50 registered projects originating from Nigeria, 22 (44%) are in the Service sector while 10 (20%) are in the Manufacturing Sector. In the case of South Africa 21 (65.6%) out of the 32 projects are in the Service Sector. The top six countries with projects numbering over 100 are Britain (171), India (170), China (155), Lebanon (131), USA (125) and Germany (103). The two leading African countries investing in Ghana are Nigeria with 50 projects and South Africa with 32 projects.

Available figures at GIPC indicated that FDI inflow into Ghana witnessed an appreciable growth since 2002.

With 132 projects registered during the first nine months of 2004, comparative figures for the same periods in 2002 and 2003 were 101, 108 indicating a growth in registered projects since 2002 (Table 3). Total FDI associated with the 132 projects of the first three quarters of 2004 was estimated at US$113.32 million, which compares favourably with the US$64.81 for 2003 and US$30 million for 2002. In satisfying the GIPC Act 1994, the minimum expected equity capital transfer is estimated at US$31.06 million as at the end of September 2004.

The actual equity capital registered by the Centre from the time of promulgation of the GIPC Act 1994 (ACT 478) to the end of September 2004 stood at US$80.99 million which is US$49.93 (160.75%) over and above the required minimum equity capital transfer required by the law. The regional distribution of the registered projects shows the concentration of most of the projects in the Greater Accra Region. About 78.83% of all registered projects are found in the Greater Accra region, 6.98% in Ashanti, Western Region has 4.59%, Central has 3.40%, Eastern 2.86%, with the remaining five regions sharing only 3.33% of the projects.

GIPC hoped that the institution of locational tax incentives to encourage companies to establish in other regions announced in the 2004 budget would appeal to investors and therefore result in more of them locating outside the Greater Accra Region.

GIPC said the registered projects between January and September 2004, had generated employment for 10,089 people.

This number is made up of 9,555 Ghanaians (94.71%) and 534 foreigners (5.29%). In line with the growth in the service sector, more people (3,983) were to be employed in that sector. The manufacturing sector is also expected to employ as many as 2396 people. The expected employment for the other sectors are, 864 for the Building and Construction, 1172 for Agriculture, 79 0 for Tourism 847 for General Trade and 82 for the Export sector. GIPC said the data i s an indication that the country is on the right economic track. This progress it attributed to prudent fiscal, monetary and international trade policy adopted by the government.