South Africa Attracts Investors to Ghana

South Africa is campaigning to encourage its companies to look for more trade and investment opportunities in Ghana, Dr. M.M Phologane, South African High Commissioner to Ghana has said.

He was launching the South African Trade and Investment Week in Accra. The 3- day event that will be held in Accra comes off on April 25, 2001, and will showcase the goods and services of about 30 Ghanaian and South African companies. It will also include cultural activities and the national day celebrations to mark the seventh year of non-racial South Africa.

Dr. Phologane said his country's relationship with Ghana has grown in the past few years. It is therefore incumbent on the two countries to create more favourable conditions mutually beneficial to the citizens of both nations.

He said it was against this background that his country decided to host the event in Ghana. It also underscores South African President Thabo Mbeki's call for an African renaissance and closer cooperation between his country and other democracies in Africa.

Relations between Ghana and South Africa date back from 1996 and could be traced back to the Apartheid era when Ghana was a partner in the struggle for freedom.

As a trading partner Ghana is ranked 26 in terms of South Africa's exports destination, and 77 in terms of her exports into South Africa. South African exports to Ghana in 1998 and 1999 was $61 million and $71 million respectively, while imports from Ghana in the same period was $3.6 million and $3.2 million respectively.

Both countries are endowed in natural and human resources and could use their comparative advantages in improving trade relations between them. South Africa has set the stage by formulating a policy that is aimed at encouraging and promoting direct investment by South African companies into Ghana.

Some of the sectors that South African entrepreneurs are directing their investments in export trade include capital equipment, agro-processing, information technology, pharmaceuticals, industrial chemicals, metal and steel, and plastics.

They are also actively involved in infrastructural development projects in Ghana in areas such as mineral extraction, road rehabilitation, real estate development, telecommunications and irrigation among others.