The Swiss Ambassador to Ghana, Markus Dutly is advocating increased trade relations between Ghana and Switzerland to improve the trade volumes between the two countries.
Ghana contributes about 57% of Switzerland’s cocoa imports which the Ambassador says is the backbone of the high-quality chocolates produced by Switzerland.
In addition to its global position in chocolate production, Switzerland also serves as one of the key importers of Ghana’s gold resource.
Trade volumes between Ghana and Switzerland stood at 1.8 billion dollars in 2017.
In an interview, Mr Markus Dutly said efforts must be enhanced to encourage more companies from Switzerland to expand their operations to Ghana.
“As I mentioned, there are around forty Swiss companies in the private sector here in Ghana so organizing more programs where these companies can meet with the necessary stakeholders will of course be very beneficial, to motivate and allow more companies to come to invest in Ghana”, he stated.
He added: “Such initiatives will be the perfect purpose for Swiss companies to be more active in semi productivity activities here in the country”.
The Swiss Ambassador was speaking during a media interaction on the sidelines of a program organized to celebrate ten years of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) work under the Trade Capacity Building program in Ghana.
The initiative launched in 2007 has so far assisted several Ghanaian companies and state agencies improve their operations and service delivery to international standards and equipped them with state of the art tools necessary for their work.
Some of the institutions that have benefitted from the UNIDO-TCB include Ghana Standards Authority, Food and Drugs Authority, Tekura, Abuesi Fish Processing, Qualiplast Ltd, Niche Confectionary and WAD African Foods Ltd.
The initiative is highly supported and partnered by the Swiss Government and the event was witnessed by the Swiss Ambassador to Ghana, Markus Dutly and UNIDO rep to Ghana Fakhruddin Azizi and Project Manager of the Trade Capacity Building Programme in Ghana Juan Pablo Davila.
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