Ghanaian textile industry needs government help
Ghana’s textile sector is struggling and needs government support, according to acting deputy general secretary of the country’s industrial and commercial workers union (ICU), Morgan Ayawine.
Speaking on November 2, Mr Ayawine said: “As a nation aspiring to achieve a middle income status by 2020, we cannot build a strong economy based on buying and selling foreign products dumped on our markets.” He believes school leavers should be encouraged to get involved in important production sectors such as the textile sector.
According to Mr Ayawine, the country’s textile industry employees just one-tenth of the 25,000 workers it employed some years ago, when the sector was at its highest point. The economic downturn and competition from overseas have done nothing to improve its prospects, he said. The answer, he believes, is provide people with jobs, and jobs that are sustainable. By investing in the textile industry, he believes the government can achieve this despite the fact that redundancy “has become the order of the day”.
