The Chief Executive of the Ghana National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GNCCI), Mark Badu-Aboagye, has bemoaned the rate at which companies are collapsing due to numerous taxes imposed on businesses.
Badu-Aboagye said members of the chamber are left with no option than to lay off workers due to the economic challenges affecting their operations.
Speaking on PM Express, he said employers are not happy with the current state of the economy.
He, however, called for the intervention of government to aid in reducing the cost of operations to ensure sustainability.
One of our workers had over 125 workers somewhere last year, but now he has abandoned some of the work he was doing. He will eventually shutdown some of his plants because it is difficult to meet up with some of the demands from these employees”, he narrated.
He further said the industry sector, in particular, has recorded negative growth consistently throughout 2023, revealing the overall challenges faced by businesses.
As of the third quarter of 2023, the growth of GDP was 2%. And when you look at the details you will realise that most of the sectors are not doing well. Consistently from the beginning of the year to now. The industry sector has recorded negative growth. It’s only in the last quarter that the manufacturing sector recorded a 2% growth. So it shows clearly that businesses are not doing well”.
“If they are doing well, they produce a lot and by multiplying it by the market value, you will see that your GDP [Gross Domestic Product] will go higher. So it’s not far-fetched, if the government wants to know the state of businesses in Ghana, just check the GDP” he said.