Ghana's Minister of Finance and Economic Planning Kwabena Duffuor told Parliament here on Wednesday the government's 2012 budget was focused mainly on infrastructure development and job creation.
"The macroeconomic stability achieved has provided the appropriate platform for accelerated growth. The priority of government over the medium-term is to find a solution to our infrastructure deficit that has hampered the country's accelerated development over the past decades."
The focus of the 2012 Budget is, therefore, on the provision of key infrastructure in various sectors of the economy to further stimulate growth, support the private sector to create more jobs and improve the incomes of Ghanaians.
"Accordingly, the budget has been appropriately tagged: ' Infrastructure Development for Accelerated Growth and Job Creation'," the minister stated.
The economy of the West African country has been projected to grow by 13.6 percent for this year as a result of oil production, increase in cocoa production, construction and mining.
The growth of the economy however has not provided one of the key results - jobs - and the unemployment rate has been rising.
The newly formed Unemployed Graduates Association of Ghana (UGAG) in August threatened to organize a massive street protest to press home their demands for the creation of jobs for the many unemployed graduates in the country.
It therefore appealed to the government to embark on a massive job creation exercise by creating the enabling business environment to give business opportunities to the many unemployed.
The sector with the highest growth estimate was industry (including mining, oil and gas), 36.2 percent, after a 5.6 percent growth last year. This was followed by services, 4.2 percent, after growing 9.8 percent last year.
Cocoa production reached the one million metric tons target set for the 2010/2011 crop year, culminating in higher growth figures for the non-oil sector.
Cocoa led the total crop sector to grow at 5.4 percent while the livestock sector grew at 5.1 percent to make the agriculture sector projections achievable.
"Non-oil sector growth should naturally be in sub-sectors that generate employment, especially for young graduates," he added.
Economist and Executive Director of the Center for Economic Policy Analysis (CEPA) Joe Abbey asserted that growth in the non- oil sector growth should have been in sub-sectors that generated employment, especially for young graduates.
He attributed the lack of employment generation in three major sectors to the high use of heavy equipment in mining and construction, which had done away with or minimized the quantum of human skilled and unskilled labor used previously in these sectors.
He also opined that the growth in the yield of cocoa was attributable to the use of modern scientific methods in cocoa farming.
"The growth generated by these three sectors would therefore not necessarily result in new jobs for young graduates," he added.
The minister hinted that part of the infrastructure development would be to develop the basic infrastructure for the utilization of gas from the country's Jubilee oil fields.
The government earlier this year constituted a Ghana National Gas Company Ltd (GNGCL) with former Health minister George Sipa Yankey as the Chief Executive to store gas in bulk quantities for national use.
"To finance infrastructure projects critical to the country's growth and development, a 3 billion U.S. dollars non-concessional but competitive facility from the China Development Bank has been sourced. In August 2011, this House mandated Government to negotiate and sign the Master Agreement for this facility," the minister told parliament.
Abbey had in an interview with Xinhua urged the government of Ghana to take bold steps in the 2012 budget to establish the infrastructure needed to capture and utilize gas.
He thought it was not prudent for the country to continue wasting resources on the West African Gas Pipeline (WAGPL) as it now had gas.
"Every nation that wants to grow industry needs this type of energy to do that, and Ghana is fortunate to have found gas," Abbey added.
He therefore said one of the most important policy measures CEPA was expecting in the 2012 budget was funding for building the gas infrastructure.
Deputy General Secretary of the General Agricultural Workers Union (GAWU) of the Ghana Trades Union Congress (GTUC), Edward Kareweh, agreed with Dr. Abbey's observation on the paradox of Ghana's growth, where the sectors that grow are not those that create jobs, "so we have growth without jobs."
He therefore believes a fund should be created with the sole purpose of funding youth agriculture as capital for youth who want to enter into agriculture.
Head of Labor Economics and Public Sector performance at the economics department of the University of Ghana, William Bekoe, urged that steps be taken to increase the performance of the manufacturing sector.
According to him, since no deliberate attempts had been made in the past to create jobs, and with industry not growing well enough, the increasing unemployment situation was a natural consequence.
He called for linkages between the various sectors of the economy, especially between agriculture and industry, so that raw materials would be readily available for agro-processing. Enditem
Editor: Xiong Tong
English.news.cn 2011-11-17 11:02:20 FeedbackPrintRSS
by Justice Lee Adoboe
ACCRA, Nov. 16 (Xinhua)
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