Seth Adjei Baah
Recent findings from the World Bank’s Doing Business Report indicate that it takes 127 days to deal with licensing issues and there are 16 procedures involved in licensing a business in Ghana while in Malaysia business licensing is done within three hours.
It is as a result of this that the Sekondi-Takoradi Regional Chamber of Commerce & Industry (STRCCI) is embarking on a campaign to address product certification barriers.
According to the Chamber, regulatory bodies such as Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Ghana Standards Board (GSB) and Food & Drugs Board (FDB) create undue bureaucratic delays in licensing and certifying businesses in the manufacturing and food sectors.
These, the chamber noted, end up increasing the cost of doing business both in terms of time and money.
Cadmond Dadzie, a consultant with the chamber, who spoke to this paper, revealed that addressing the licensing and certification problems will improve the business environment in Ghana.
He further noted that an easy and simplified product certification process will lead to improved service delivery, efficiency and above all protect consumers.
“There should be the creation of a one-stop shop for the licensing of products, thereby reducing the complexity and rather frustrating product certification processes and also the amount of time spent dealing with these agencies.”
This, he indicated, will lessen the incidence of businesses having to visit various agencies and paying several fees for the certification of a single product.
Vincent Annan, Executive Secretary of the STRCCI, pointed out that it was very cumbersome for producers to move from one agency to another as well as pay different fees for various certifications for the same product.
He therefore called for an easy and simplified product certification process to improve the business environment and ensure efficiency in reducing cost and time during the certification process.
From Emmanuel Opoku, Takoradi