Right regulations, new policy regime for construction sector will be game changer - GhCCI

Mr Kwadwo Osei-Asante, the Executive Director, Cost Plan Consult Ltd, who is a consultant to the Ghana Chamber of Construction Industry (GhCCI) says Ghana’s construction sector can grow more if the right regulations and policy regime to safe guard the industry’s productivity are put in place.

He cited investment constraints, ineffective public sector spending and private sector investment and lack of interpretations of investment trends, compromises on quality, cost, time, productivity, health, social, security/safety, environment, relations and value for money as some of the challenges confronting the industry.

Speaking in an interview with the Ghanaian Times in Accra he said to reverse the dwindling fortunes and push the industry forward the GhCCI has a vision to promote the sector to enable it to increase its contribution to overall Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth.

He said the vision of GhCCI is to create a construction industry development strategy to promote stability, foster economic growth, encourage international competitiveness, create sustainable employment, address any historic imbalances, and generate new construction industry capacity

To fulfil this vision, he said GhCCI is promoting and building enabling environment under the auspices of the Ministry of Works and Housing to coordinate all activities in the industry, increase competitiveness of domestic construction enterprises, and to transform and regulate industry processes.

The GhCCI he said also seek to increase value for money to industry clients, place well sustainability responsibility in the delivery process, and increase viability of domestic

Mr. Osei-Asante said for dialogue to promote the industry to be most productive, it must be private-sector driven and GhCCI had taken the initiative to advocate for its priorities in a participatory policy process.

He said GhCCI believed the Public Private Dialogue (PPD) activity is an initiative to build effective and sustainable public-private collaborations amongst the government, Private Sector and Civil Society, and improve the business enabling environment and generate more dynamic and sustainable economic growth.

The PPD he said would improve the business enabling environment and generate more dynamic and sustainable economic growth.

“The GhCCI notes that PPD as an essential component of efforts to reformu governance and the business climate, and Dialogue improves the flow of information relating to economic policy and builds legitimacy into the policy process,” he said.

Mr Osei-Asante said there is the need to prepare a framework for Construction Industry Development regulation and determine the skill manpower requirements, certification and expertise of persons to ensure professionalism & improve the capabilities of firms.

Throwing more light on the way forward he said the GhCCI was keen on must developing the capacity of the Construction Industry through productivity, knowledge and professionalism, innovation and improvement of quality of life.

He cited manpower development, technology development and business development as areas that needed improvement to spur the sector’s growth.

The GhCCI commissioned Research Report for Public Private Dialogue (PPD) Platform for the Construction Sector with support from Business Sector Advocacy Challenge (BUSAC) Fund with USAID and DANIDA

Findings in the Report among others intended to establish, facilitate and strengthen PPD to catalyse reforms and promote inclusive policy-making, and embrace “inclusive dialogue for building a policy environment conducive to sustainable development”.