The Ghana National Chamber of Commerce & Industry (GNCCI) in collaboration with the BUSAC Fund have expressed their intent to provide business diagnostics data for policy innovation as well as monitor business performance.

In a three day residential retreat with stakeholders, the Chamber of Commerce intimated that, the dialogue was necessary to ensuring the implementation of business diagnostics.

President of the GNCCI, Mr. Clement Osei-Amoako, in his opening remarks, expressed his appreciation to the stakeholders for honoring the invitation which emphasizes the “importance that stakeholders attach to the mobilization of business diagnostics data to inform policy design and implementation”.

According to him, the GNCCI has developed a robust analytical framework that adopts evidence-based approach to index and track business value and growth metrics, risk exposures and mitigating strategies, and impact of industrial and trade related policies on businesses in Ghana.

He was convinced that, the business diagnostics report presents the country with a huge opportunity to assess the readiness of MSMEs as well as corporates and large enterprises in the participation of the AfCFTA.

Mr. Amoako also assured stakeholders of the Chamber’s commitment in using business data analytics to provide targeted business-support services to its members and the business community at large.

The Fund Manager of BUSAC Fund, Mr. Nicolas Gebara, commended the GNCCI for the bold initiative, through the business performance indexes and SME Policy Index, to support government’s policies and programmes for a conducive environment.

He noted this is “a real approach of having a constructive means to dialogue and to help the growth of SMEs in terms of job creation, which is a key locomotive of the economy”.

Mr. Gebara affirmed that the GNCCI is in a better position as a dialogue partner with government on the basis of business diagnostic data. He urged the GNCCI and stakeholders to ensure continuity of the data inputs as well as interpret the data accordingly to inform policy design and implementation.

In his presentation, Mr. Julius Bradford Lamptey (Head of Research & Advocacy) underscored the GNCCI’s legislative mandate of promoting and protecting commercial and industrial interests in the country.

He was of the opinion that, one of the legislative functions of the GNCCI is the “collection and circulation of statistics relating to trade, commerce, industry and manufactures”.

Thus, the GNCCI Business Pulse serves as one of the avenues adopted by the Chamber to mobilize business diagnostics data to serve the interest of the private sector of Ghana.

Mr. Lamptey intimated that the GNCCI Business Pulse would seek to build synergistic relationships with stakeholders in mobilizing the requisite data to inform policy innovation and design.

In this regard, Mr. Lamptey informed participants that the GNCCI would be requesting institutional representation on the GNCCI SME Index Committee and Governance Board.

The focus group discussion on the key findings (business performance metrics) with stakeholders addressed policy response to large and corporate enterprises on the one hand, and MSMEs on the other hand.

The stakeholders agreed that the Ministry of Trade & Industry should be tasked with policy ownership and work with other ministries, agencies, departments as well as private institutions in implementing the policy response.

Focusing on the MSMEs, policy response should aim at encouraging re-investment of retained earnings, ensuring access to cheaper cost of capital, encouraging business advisory services, expanding production capacity, and investing in innovation capacity.

The policy response should nurture the growth-potential of SMEs and transition them into value-driven ones to ensure sustainability. Given its unique mandate to support the growth of start-ups and SMEs, the Ministry for Business Development was tasked with policy ownership and work with related ministries, agencies, departments as well as private institutions in implementing the policy response.