Grant tax holidays to new enterprises-NBSSI

Ho, Nov. 20, GNA - Mr Emmanuel Nyarko, Volta Regional Director of the National Board for Small Scale Industries (NBSSI), on Wednesday called on government to grant tax holidays to new enterprises especially those of young people. This would help to lay firm macro-economic structures to propel self-employment in the country. Mr Nyarko was delivering a talk on "The Engineer as entrepreneur" at the open day of the Faculty of Engineering of Ho Polytechnic. He said the country's private sector development must be founded on small scale production using locally designed and appropriate technologies developed by engineering students. He urged the students to take advantage of the "current good economic atmosphere in the country" and seek credit to translate their visions into ventures.

"What you have to do is to acquire start up capital from financial institutions such as Venture Capital Trust Fund, MASLOC and other non-banking institutions to get established," Mr Nyarko said. He appealed to the students to form joint ventures, pool resources and translate their ideas into tangible achievements to the benefit of society.

Mr Francis Yao Agbenyo, a Senior Engineer at the Volta River Authority who gave a talk on "Maintenance Culture-The role of the Engineer", urged companies to integrate maintenance strategy into their business operations.

Mr Seth Dzokoto, Dean of the Engineering Faculty of the polytechnic, said the open day was to afford the students the opportunity to interact with professionals and to create awareness for them to "reconstitute maintenance culture and entrepreneurship as alternative to new equipment and facility".