In 2018, about 96% of electrical products sold on the Ghanaian market were below standards
• Traders selling substandard electrical products will soon be sanctioned
• The Ghana Standards Authority will hit the market to apprehend culpable persons
• In 2018, about 96% of electrical products sold on the Ghanaian market were below standards
The Ghana Standards Authority has revealed plans to sanction and apprehend traders who were found culpable for selling substandard electrical products on the market.
The move according to the Authority is necessary to curb the menace of substandard electrical products being sold on the Ghanaian market.
Director of the Ghana Standards Authority, Professor Alex Dodoo speaking with journalists in Accra said, a swoop exercise to rid of the substandard electrical products on the market, will commence from next week across the country.
“From next week, we are going around the country, and the first thing GSA wants to do is to make a business suite, our job is to facilitate business not to be a barrier to your business. Government interest is to help businesses so that you make your profit quickly, any delay from myself or staff is bad for business and bad for Ghana and please if that happens let us know because as a country if we don’t apply the necessary sanctions because as a country if our businessmen,” the GSA Director-General explained.
“We are starting what we call electro vigilance, we are vigilant on all electrical goods, we have even built West Africa’s first air conditioning lab so that AC’s freezers and refrigerators can be tested, it is yet to be inaugurated but it is open for business,” he added.
Professor Dodoo revealed this when the Traders Advocacy Group Ghana (TAGG) paid a courtesy call on him.
The GSA Director-General further said the members of the TAGG will join personnel from his outfit to conduct the swoop exercise in the markets.
“We will also go with you [TAGG] on our market surveillance, we don’t want the surveillance to be like a policeman catching a thief but rather traders and government working to make sure that the rules are the same that traders that are doing good business will have their business protected and those doing business which is not legal will not have a place to operate in Ghana,” he pointed.
The issue of substandard electrical products on the market has been worrying. In 2018, it was discovered that about 96 percent of electrical products sold on the Ghanaian market were below standards.