GSA Debunks Media Reports Of Introducing New Import Tariffs


The Ghana Standards Authority has debunked newspaper reports that the Authority will from October 1 2014 introduce new fees on pre-shipment inspection on all imported goods.

There are media reports that the GSA has entered into a contract with Switzerland based Societe Generale de surveillance to provide inspection, verification, testing and certification.

Concerns have been raised that the contract will give the Swiss company monopoly to inspect all cargo coming into Ghana from Switzerland.

But the public relations officer of the GSA Kofi Amponsah Bediako says the new arrangement which is coming out of the Ghana product conformity assessment program will not impose new tariffs on imports

Speaking to Ultimate Radio, he insisted that the media reports were deliberately calculated to undo the newly launched GCAP which should kick start in October.

From the inception of the program, all consignments arriving at Ghana’s ports of entry not accompanied by Certificates of Conformity (CoC) will be denied entry into the country.

Importers who would dodge the system to import products without CoC would be charged a penalty of 30 per cent of the CIF value of the consignment and the product will be re-shipped to the original destination at a cost to the importer.

Kofi Amponsah Bediako further explained that it was the supplier or the manufacturer who is to pay for the certification and not someone going in to purchase the product as being speculated.

“It is not for consumers to pay more as some papers are falsely saying; it is not to impose new tariffs but it is just to ensure that before the product comes here it would have been tested and found to be good,” he cleared.

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