Scrap clearing duties on PPEs – Assoc. of PPEs Ghana 'begs' govt

There is currently a tall list of persons whose Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) are stuck at the various ports as a result of lack of funds to clear the items. This is according to the Importers and Wholesalers Association of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Ghana.

The Association is, therefore, calling on the government to consider scrapping the clearing duty on all PPEs imported into the country this COVID-19 era.

Their request follows the recent steep price drop in plastic face shield, a PPE that was in high demand between May and July this year.

“They can’t clear it (face shields), someone has to go clear his shield with about GH20,000, the person has already invested about GH50,000 in it but they are not going to get a penny out of it… if the government scraps off the clearing duties on PPEs that will help".

Speaking to GhanaWeb in an interview, the PRO of the Importers and Wholesalers Association of PPE Ghana, Kelvin King-Dawie revealed that some persons managed to bring in substandard face shields into the country which were sold at a cheaper price.

This phenomenon he believes, pushed sellers who had the original products to also sell it for less, contributing to their loss. He, however, admitted that “buying and re-buying with the mind to resell it increased the prices of face shield” in the country. At a point in time, a single plastic face shield was sold as high as GH¢50.00

“When the prices started falling and people began making fun on social media, those who brought the genuine products also panicked because they thought they were going to lose their investment… they got scared and started reducing the prices,” he said.

Mr. King-Dawie told GhanaWeb that when their members “ went to clear their goods at the point of entries, the quantity that they were expecting did not arrive but they told them that this was the quantity that arrived. According to the agent that shipped the things (face shields) from China and elsewhere they sent the exact quantities”.