The Ghanaian Journal

The Minister of Trade, Industry, PSD and PSI, Papa Owusu Ankomah has stated that the surest way to ensure free and fair trade is to adhere to rules governing international trade which over the years has necessitated the ever increasing importance of Standards, technical regulation and conformity assessment procurement.

The minister stated this at the first importers forum held in Accra . According to him, trade liberalization has increased the competitiveness of goods and services. He said, pre-shipment inspection (PSI) was introduced as part of international trade for many years, but in Ghana , it was introduced to assist with the implementation of customs procedures to ensure that imported goods were of the stated quality and quantity.

Papa Owusu Ankomah noted that under PSI inspection agencies were employed to carry out checks on goods at their points of exist (exporting country) on behalf of the importing country prior to exportation.

Explaining further, the minister disclosed that any additional costs incurred by the exporter during the export process, whether directly that is in the form of charges levied by the inspection company, or indirectly which is in the form of additional obligations were passed onto the buyer and posed some challenges resulting in unnecessary cost build up.

He said in order to move away from these challenges; the government of Ghana in the year 2000 phased out the PSI and introduced the Destination Inspection Scheme to reduce controls and delays during the movement of goods and to replace such controls with audit based methods and post-verification checks on goods.

The Trade Minister revealed that in August 2003, the Ghana Standards Board was mandated by the Ministry of Trade and Industry to be in charge of the inspection of some selected imports called ‘High Risk Goods’ (HRGs) to confront challenges that come with trade liberalization.

“These challenges include importation of inferior goods, dumping of cheap products on our markets, counterfeiting and piracy. The destination inspection was to be carried out all the ports of entry in Ghana , and we have wholly achieved that objective”.

According to him the most disturbing situation has to with the HRGs which poses health and safety implementations on the consuming public like food products, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and others.

He therefore called on the stakeholders to understand each others mandate and role to allow for smooth operations at the ports of entry.
Micah Audrey