Minister-designate for Trades and Industry KT Hammond has expressed disappointment over the importation of ”yemuadie” which is known as tripe.
The nominee is not happy the country imports this commodity and others including rice.
He quizzed “why is it that everything you can think about is being imported into the country? These importations have terrible effects on our foreign exchange reserves. I think it’s about time we took a serious look at this particular issue. I’m told a committee was put up by cabinet to deal specifically with this matter”.
“When I looked at some of the issues that have been raised, I was scandalised. I’m told it’s being decided at that level [cabinet] that we should be looking at about 50 specific areas. I’m scandalised at what appears to be in paragraph 4, is that what we are importing to Ghana? We are importing guts, bladders, stomachs of animals to Ghana to complement our foods. And that alone totalled about one hundred and sixty-four million, five hundred and seventy-five thousand plus some hundreds of dollars[the year under review]. I thought this is a little bit of a scandal. It’s not only this but this is what I find scandalising”.
“There are other things on the list such as rice, and beverage. I happened to find out that we were smuggling rice into the country without disclosing it. Because if you look at how much we produce locally, and how much we consume, and you do the subtraction, there’s a gap of about 500-600 metric tons which we consume that are not accounted for in the system.
“There are other ones too, second-hand clothing, vehicles, there are quite a lot that government feels should ensure some sanity in the system.”
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana
