Government unveils Sparkup Summit to unlock Ghana’s investment potentials

The maiden Sparkup Summit will come off in Accra on Monday, 6 September 2021 to identify and account for the US$2.7 billion foreign direct investment (FDI) that the country received last year.

The summit will be opened by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and will attract ministers of state, heads of financial institutions, facilitator agencies, local communities, young entrepreneurs, regulators, and private sector service providers to deliberate on ways of unlocking the country’s investment potentials to promote economic growth.

The event is on the theme: “Re-awakening the Giant; Maximising Ghana’s Investment Potentials”.

It is being organised by the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) in collaboration with the Ministry of Information.

Information Minister Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, who officially launched the summit in Accra on Tuesday (3 August), said the US$2.7 billion FDI received into the various sectors of the Ghanaian economy went into 279 projects in eight regions and expected to create 27,000 jobs.

He said the focus of the Summit hinged on three ‘Os’ – Opportunities, Open, and Optimistic – intended to create opportunities for Ghanaian businesses, young entrepreneurs and promote partnerships between local businesses and foreign investors.

Oppong Nkrumah said it would also create a platform for national conversation among key stakeholders and re-ignite the passion and desire to add value to the natural resources for economic growth.

He said over the past five years, Ghana had registered 721 foreign direct investments and the summit would be an opportunity to assess how those investors navigated their way in terms of registering their businesses, connecting electricity and water to their factories, acquisition of land and other services and suggest ways to improve upon them.

Yofi Grant, the chief executive officer of GIPC, in his welcome remarks, said the Sparkup Summit would be organised annually to boost FDI and lead the way for the country’s economic emancipation.

He said despite the COVID-19 pandemic that had resulted in a 3.5% global economic contraction, with the Sub-Sahelian economy contracting by negative 3%, the Ghanaian economy showed resilience, growing by 0.4% in 2020.

Grant noted that even before the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, the country witnessed an average economic growth of seven per cent from 2017 to 2019.

“We must, therefore, position ourselves properly and strategise to attract more Foreign Direct Investment to boost the economy, create jobs and ensure wealth creation,” he said.

Grant said with the country hosting the Africa Continental Free Trade Area(AfCTA) Secretariat, coupled with stable democratic credentials, it was imperative to make headway in enhancing the productive sectors of the economy to create jobs and move from a developing nation status to a developed one.

He was with the conviction that the GHC100 billion Ghana CARES “Obaatanpa” programme and other flagship initiatives such as the ‘One-District, One-Factory’ and ‘Planting for Food and Jobs’ would go a long way to rejuvenate the economy and businesses, ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic.

He said the nation had set a target of attracting three billion dollars in FDI, this year, and had received US$830 million as of the first half of the year.

The CEO of GIPC indicated that it was the responsibility of the private sector to galvanise their energies to mobilise 70% of the GHC100 billion Ghana CARES amount whilst the government brought the additional 30% for a successful roll-out of the programme in the next three and a half years.

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