Government of Ghana has given financial support to four local companies to help them produce Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) for front line health workers involved in Covid-19 fight.
The companies, namely DTRT Apparel, Cadling Fashion, Alfie Design and Sleek Garment Export Limited have all received a total of $10 million dollars as loans to produce the PPEs to meet the country’s demands.
The loan facility is provided by government through the Ghana Exim Bank. It will boost the capacity of the companies to produce face masks, scrubs, and protective gowns for use by health works
Again, with this support, the companies are expected to produce more to supply Ghana and other West African countries that have already put in requests.
Background of four local companies
In response to the global shortate of PPEs, the Government of Ghana engaged some four local manufacturing companies to produce the protective gears for its front-line health workers.
As a show of its commitment the Minister of Trade and Industry few weeks ago paid a working visit to the facilities of the four companies to assess their preparedness for the task ahead.
Addressing the workers, Mr Kyerematen encouraged them to put in their best and adhere to all precautionary measures by the World Health Organisation (WHO) to prevent getting infected.
A tour of the four companies in the Greater Accra Region showed hundreds of workers busily sewing the face masks.
Capacities of each of the four local companies
DTRT Apparel has the capacity to produce from 50,000 up to half a million units a week.
And to demonstrate its commitment to the course, the company has converted its production capacity to the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE) to meet the needs of the country.
This means that DTRT Apparel has the capacity to manufacture from 50,000 to 500,000 units of PPES every week for Ghana.
“As the nation moves Beyond Aid and towards becoming a part of the global solution, we at DTRT remain committed to maintaining production of PPE and supporting response efforts for as long as PPE items are needed in Ghana, the sub-region or the World”, DTRT said in an email to the Ghana Talks Business.
However, the Head of Finance at DTRT Apparel, Nurudeen Mohamed, in an interaction with media said “we are ready to go into full production of the 200,000 face masks by next week”.
Cadling Fashion, on the other hand, says with the financial support from the government, they can produce a minimum of 30,000 face masks a day.
Also, Alfie Designs, and Sleek Garment Export Limited said they could produce 45,000 to 50,000 face masks a day.
Job creation
For her part, the Chief Executive of the EXIM Bank Ghana, Lawrence Agyinsam, says investing in the local companies has created jobs for the youth because additional hands have been engaged to produce the masks.
“The Ghana EXIM made the investment long before the COVID-19 outbreak. It shows you that we are interested in the growth of Ghanaian companies,” he said.
