Vice President and New Patriotic Party (NPP) Flagbearer, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has outlined nine incentives to strengthen businesses, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) when he wins the 2024 presidential elections.
These initiatives, he said, would be part of his government’s plan to boost economic growth and job creation.
Speaking at the launch of the NPP’s 2024 Manifesto in Takoradi on Sunday, Dr. Bawumia emphasized his administration’s commitment to delivering bold solutions for businesses and job opportunities.
He revealed a set of business-friendly policies designed to create a supportive environment for growth, including a favourable tax regime and direct incentives.
The nine key incentives announced by Dr. Bawumia include:
a. Incentivise Ghanaian start-ups in selected, strategic sectors with Investment Tax Credits (ITC) for the first three (3) years of their operations
b. Flat Rate for all importers; bringing predictability and stability on prices of imported goods.
c. Harmonise port charges to align with changes in competing regional ports, particularly Togo. Duties at our ports will be the same or lower.
d. Use the Government’s purchasing power to stimulate industrial expansion and business growth, which will help create jobs, by rolling out a “Buy Ghana First” policy under which all goods and services procured by the public sector will first be filled by goods and services produced locally.
e. Implement a shift in electricity tariff structure to a regime in which commercial rates are either equal to, or lower than residential rates, never higher, to power industries and businesses.
f. Establish an SME Bank to meet the special financing needs of small and medium businesses, which employ over 80% of Ghanaians.
g. Reform the licensing regime for the small-scale mining sector, reduce the minerals export tax to 1% to discourage gold smuggling, and establish a Minerals Development Bank to finance viable local mineral projects, small-scale miners, and Ghanaian mining and mining services firms.
h. Complete the digitalisation of land titling and registration to allow owners of landed properties to use their properties as collateral to raise capital for business growth and expansion.
i. Special Economic Zones ( Free Zones) will also be created in collaboration with the private sector at Ghana’s major border towns such as Aflao, Paga, Elubo, Sankasi and Tatale to enhance economic activity, increase exports, reduce smuggling and create jobs.