General News of Thursday, 22 February 2018
Source: www.ghanaweb.com
2018-02-22
Maki Ozawa, Senior Representative of Japan International Cooperation Agency
Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has called on the government of Ghana to adopt a bottom-up approach in implementing its transformational and industrialisation agenda.
This call comes at a time when the Nana Akufo-Addo led government is putting measures in place to transform Ghana’s economy through industrialization projects such as the famous One-District, One-Factory and the Planting for Food and Job projects.
Speaking at the 49th Annual General Meeting and the launch of the 13th Surveyors Week in Accra Thursday, a Senior Representative of Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) called on importers to desist from importing goods that can be produced in Ghana and support indigenous industries by patronizing them.
Maki Ozawa said, in the late 50s Japan struggled to take off because it imported more than it exported which posed a trade deficit making it difficult to save foreign currencies in the country.
But with stringent measures put in place by the government of Japan, she said, the country rose to be the second largest economy in the world in 1968.
“We can attribute the success of Japan’s economy in 1968 to three main factors; promoting Japanese products, improve on human resources and the third was investment into quality infrastructure” she revealed.
She was optimistic that if such measures are applied to the Ghanaian economy, the results would be overwhelming.
She disclosed the Japanese government’s readiness to partner Ghana to implement industrialisation project using feasible methods.
“We are now cooperating with Ghana to implement developmental projects using those transformational factors,” she noted.