Takoradi MP Flags Financing Gaps and Regulatory Delays as Key Threats to Ghana’s MSMEs

Hon. Kwabena Okyere Darko-Mensah, Member of Parliament for Takoradi, has raised alarm over the financing and regulatory bottlenecks constraining Ghana’s micro, small and medium enterprises, MSMEs.

Speaking on a statement in Parliament, the Takoradi MP said the House must focus more on growth and revenue than expenditure alone.

“Mr. Speaker, about ninety percent of the statements that are made here in this House has always been about expenditure. But this is a statement about growth and about revenue,” he said.

He described MSMEs as “the backbone of every economy in the world” and called for urgent support to unlock their potential.

*Access to finance drying up*

Hon. Darko-Mensah said banks are increasingly moving capital to the Bank of Ghana because of higher interest rates, leaving little for MSMEs.

“So there's no money in the system. So even when people produce in the villages... the small micro medium enterprises that needs this money to buy from the farm gates just don't have the capital to go and buy. And in doing so we also slow down the growth of these companies and also slow down the growth of this country,” he noted.

The MP also criticized multiple regulatory agencies shutting down shops and the long delays in securing permits.

“Today this one locks your shop. They open it. The next person goes locks your shop. So even the energy to do business by the small and micro industry becomes a difficulty,” he said.

Citing the Food and Drugs Authority, he added: “FDA when people apply sometimes it takes more than a year. for them to get a license just to manufacture.” He said the delays force some MSMEs to operate without approval.

On small-scale mining, he said: “People ask for license. It takes them three years before they get a license.”

Hon. Darko-Mensah urged government to decentralize licensing and regulation to the districts instead of centralizing everything in Accra.

“If somebody needs an FDA license why does it have to come to Accra?... In China economic zones and free zone enclaves are managed by unit committee not even the district assemblies. So you see them always growing but us we continue to use the power of centralization to create bottlenecks for our own people,” he argued.