As a result of unsatisfactory performance of the country’s textile industry, Ghana is planning to lay-off textile workers. The Ghana Federation of Labour noted that the step is being taken because of the prevalent smuggling of cheap and fake fabric prints from China which is collapsing the local industry.
Abraham Koomson, General Secretary of the federation stated, “Many of these smugglers don’t pay appropriate duties and taxes to the Government. Whereas, the manufacturers are paying VAT, health insurance and social security contribution of workers and corporate taxes, the smugglers don’t pay anything.”
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It’s worth mentioning here that Ghana employs just 1,500 workers in textile industry unlike 1970’s where the workforce was more than 25,000. Similarly, the more than 130 million metres of fabric the industry produced annually in the country has also been reduced drastically to less than 30 million over the years.
However, Koomson emphasized the need for Government to deal with the fundamental challenges confronting the industry to prevent the total collapse of the sector. “The workers are additionally calling for the re-activation of the work of the anti-textiles piracy task force that was set up by the Trade Ministry in 2010 to deal with traders in counterfeit textiles as a way to keep the industry afloat,” concluded Koomson.
