Dr. Afua Asabea Asare, the Chief Executive Officer of Ghana Export Promotion Authority (GEPA), has revealed the Authority is ready to own the She trades and ST4 projects to enhance their benefits to Small, Medium and Micro small enterprises.

Dr Asabea speaking at a meeting with the visiting Executive Director of the International Trade Centre (ITC), Ms. Pamela Coke-Hamilton, stated that the two projects have been highly impactful to the cause of SMEs in the export sector.

Touching on the relevance of the projects, Dr. Afua Asabea Asare noted the SheTrades Project aims to facilitate the participation of Women-Owned Businesses (WOBs) in international trade and increase job creation.

“It increases their visibility and connect them to potential buyers, investors, suppliers and business support organizations and provide capacity building trainings including e-learning courses, on-site workshops and webinars, to teach new skills that will help WOBs grow their businesses as well as provide comprehensive support to attend national, regional and international buyer to seller trade events.”
Dr. Afua Asabea Asare

Dr Asabea averred that GEPA has a strong relationship with ITC and implements most of the ITC’s support programmes targeted at both small and medium sized, and women-owned businesses in the country.

GEPA’s CEO disclosed that the meeting between Ms. Pamela Coke-Hamilton and herself was to give the ITC Executive Director the opportunity to hear from the beneficiaries of some of the projects implemented in partnership with GEPA, specifically, the She-Trades and Trade for Sustainable Development (T4SD) programmes as part of her official visit to Ghana.

Dr Asabea lauded the ITC for the collaboration over the years and called for continued partnership to continue to collaborate with the centre on its various trade promotion interventions.

On her part, Ms Pamela Coke-Hamilton commended government on its various trade facilitating interventions, especially those for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).

ITC’s Executive Director said this could help support young businesses to benefit from direct interventions. She indicated her preparedness to develop more technology and digitization in the agriculture value chain.

“We want to see how we can work more in the value chains, like the shea butter, helping you develop more in terms of your digitalisation, smart agriculture, value chain addition in agri-processing. All the various areas that we think have great potential in Ghana and for export elsewhere.”
Ms Coke-Hamilton

Ms Coke-Hamilton noted the government’s 1D1F programme could build sustainability across the nation’s business landscape and increase employment by multiple folds.

“So, I think what is really helpful for us is not only indirectly working with MSME’s and micro enterprises but also to have a governmental ecosystem and also institutional partner like GEPA to be able to work with you in partnership and get much greater result.”
Ms Coke-Hamilton

In the intervening time, the beneficiaries extolled the benefits of the projects, especially the capacity building and support to attend national, regional and international buyer to seller trade events, to the growth of their businesses.