The Chief Executive Officer of the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI), Seth Twum-Akwaboah has commended Kantanka for their substantial growth in the automobile industry in Ghana and encouraged them to increase capacity to capture the entire Ghanaian market and even beyond.
He praised kantanka’s initial market strategy and also urged them to adopt good financing model for their products by partnering with the banks. “The current Minister of Finance and the Deputy Speaker of Parliament use their vehicle as well so once they got to that stage and started developing the mass market, that was the right thing, but of course, they have to grow it further and I think one area they need to critically look at is how they can partner financial institutions who will give loan facilities for workers, companies, institutions and individuals who can tap into a kind of resources and buy their vehicles.”
He also urged them to be able to produce at a minimal cost but without compromising quality to ensure sustainability of their products in the market.
“They need to continuously work on efforts to reduce cost as much as possible, if you have a high volume, at a reduced cost, then the cost per unit also reduces, then you become competitive in the market. But never compromise on quality, just because you want to reduce cost, if you do so, people may use it today, but you cannot retain the customers.”
He further advised Kanatanka to ensure efficient sustenance of their supply chain by making their parts assessable everywhere and also train house hold mechanics to make repairs of their vehicles during breakdowns easier.
“Well stocked parts in different parts of the country in different market centers are very key and again they need to train local mechanics who can fix these vehicles because for every vehicle, today you may buy it new, tomorrow is old, so definitely, you will need these mechanics to have a supply or value chain system that works.”
The AGI President applauded government for the new Ghana Automotive Manufacturing Development Programme Policy to promote local assemblers and manufacturers of cars.
“It’s basically a general policy to encourage made-in Ghana products, and we have always said that government procurement is key if you want to support local industries and therefore government coming out with the policy that government institutions should give priority to the purchase of locally assembled vehicles, I think it’s a very good policy and it should be encouraged.”
The AGI boss was also quick to advise that government should move beyond procuring the vehicles to ensuring prompt payment in order to keep the assemblers in business.
“We should make deliberate efforts to ensure that if we are buying from the locally assembled plants, then let’s pay promptly”.
He also encouraged government to put in place measures to reduce cost of production including reduction in import taxes and called on government agencies and embassies to help promote export of the Kantanka cars.
“So we have to continuously advocate and government must continuously listen to us, to help reduce cost of production.”
The AGI CEO revealed that Kantanka has an urge in the sub-regional market and the regional market, but advised that they build a buoyant local market first.
“Looks like the local market is catching on, so once you have good grasp of the local market, you can then lunch into the other markets.”
AGI applauded Kantanka for not seeing other assemblers as competitors and urged Ghanaians to develop confidence in their product as well as all made in Ghana products.