Economics

Minority shareholders and the Board of the Produce Buying Company Limited (PBC), have renewed calls for a recapitalization of the company.

This follows PBC’s admission that the continuous reliance on bank loans is taking a toll on the company’s finances.

“The company’s overreliance on borrowings from the market to supplement funds for purchases still presents it with a cost outlay too heavy to bear,” PBC’s CEO, Maxwell Kojo Atta-Krah said.

Employees of the Electricity Company of Ghana in Tema embarked on a three-hour demonstration in line with the workers’ protest of government’s decision to cede the management of the company to a private entity.

Several workers, clad in red, downed their tools for three hours and carried placards to press home their demands. One of the placards read: “Government just be a little sensitive to the same people who voted you power.”

“Politicians stop dumping substandard meters on ECG,” another placard read.

Directors of education have been asked to do more to cut out the waste and purge the service of corrupt practices.

Professor Jane Naana Opoku-Agyeman, the Education Minister, said everything must be done to check the false claims, remove the ghost and fake teachers from the system.

She made the call in an address read for her at the 23rd annual meeting of the Conference of Directors of Education (CODE) in Kumasi.

“Investing in quality education for positive transformation of the youth for national development” is the theme chosen for the five-day event.

Accra, Aug. 23, GNA – Mr Seth Tekper, Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, said the government has since 2015 taken proactive policy actions to address the various emerging risks in the economy.

He said world-class technical partners are fixing the technical issues that disrupted oil production at the Jubilee Field, which has resulted in two field production, storage and off-loading vessels (FPSOs) and two oil production fields are in place in 2016 as against only one in 2015.

Accra, Aug. 23, GNA – Trade volume between Ghana and China by the end of May 2016, has hit $2.4 billion, Mr Emmanuel Habuka Bombande, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration has stated.

He said in 2015 the trade volume between the two countries reached $6.6 billion.

Although the general trade by 18 per cent in 2015 due to global price decline, Ghana was ranked 6th in Africa in terms of trade volume with China.

President John Mahama says government may place a cap on interest rate if plans to secure a single digit inflation next year fails.

Ghana last recorded single digit inflation in January 2013, recording 8.8 percent. Inflation for July 2016 was 16.7 percent.

The President who gave the hint at the 15th edition of the Ghana Club 100 said a further decline in inflation will prevent government from placing a cap on the rising interest rate.

“Inflation has begun to fall and it is our expectation that we will end the year at about 14% and achieve single digit next year.

The first direct commercial flight on Friday August 19, 2016, took off from the upgraded Tamale Airport to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for the 2016 Hajj.

President John Dramani Mahama bid the first batch of 500 prospective Pilgrims from the three regions of the north farewell, ahead of their departure.

The rest of the Pilgrims have been scheduled to depart from the Tamale Airport to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on Saturday August 20th, and Sunday 21st August.

Accra, Aug. 19, GNA – Trading on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) on the third week of August bourse ended with transactions in 14 equities, with eight prices changes in an advance to decline ratio of 1:7.

The benchmark GSE - Composite Index dropped by 0.4 per cent to close at 1,824.4 points, stock market analysis made available to the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Friday by Nordea Capital, an investment bank, has stated.

Takoradi, Aug. 19, GNA - President John Dramani Mahama has said indigenous small-scale businesses have received one billion dollars worth of contracts from petroleum companies since the commencement of commercial production of crude oil in the country.

He said the award of contracts to local enterprises was in compliance with the country’s Local Content and Participation Policy which had created over 7,000 jobs aimed at ensuring that the hydrocarbon resources benefited Ghanaians.

Accra, Aug 18, GNA - The Association of Ghana Industries (AGI) has urged the private sector to support government’s efforts in the establishment of EXIM Bank- Ghana.

Mr James Asare-Adjei, the AGI President, said the activities of the bank would inure to the benefit of industries and businesses in the country.

He said the AGI in its advocacy, as the leading voices of private sector, had been highlighting challenges and difficulties which frustrate growth efforts of businesses and continued to stifle the country's industrialisation drive.