Daily Heritage July 24

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Quake Edition 114.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 9:05 PM Page 7 21ST JULY 2017 FRIDAY CURRENCY PARIS CODE BUYING SELLING US Dollar USDGHS 4.3682 4.3724 RATES Pound Sterling GBPGHS 5.6664 5.6745 Euro GBPGHS 5.0856 5.0897 10 DAILY HERITAGE MONDAY, JULY 24, 2017 WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH Residents of Birim North to access quality dental care RESIDENTS OF Birim North District, in the Eastern Region, now have access to quality dental care as Vivo Energy Ghana, the Shell licensee, has donated an ultra-modern dental chair to the New Abirem Government Hospital. The donation, which forms part of the company’s community investment programme, was done in collaboration with Newmont Golden Ridge Limited, Akyem Mine. The ultra-modern dental chair has the following features: an LED display screen which helps patients to view live pictures of what is going on in their mouth so that they can appreciate discussions with the dental surgeon better; an intraoral camera which captures live pictures for diagnosing and for e-records; an inbuilt x-ray viewer that allows dental surgeons to view manually processed x-rays; an LED fast hand piece which emits light when drilling; and a water cooled straight hand piece that allows the dentist to perform surgical extraction much more easily. At the handing over ceremony, the Managing Director of Vivo Energy Ghana, Mr Ebenezer Faulkner, speaking to the local community, said: “As a mining community in which our client Newmont operates, your needs •Dr Stephen Quarcoo, Dental Surgeon of New Abirem Hospital demonstrating the unique features of the Dental Chair donated by Vivo Energy Ghana are of deep importance to us. With this chair, the New Abirem Government Hospital can deliver dental services to the people of the Birim North District, with its population of about 90,000. This will ease the burden of patients travelling long distances to Kwahu Government Hospital to access dental care.” The General Manager of Newmont Golden Ridge Limited, Akyem Mine, Mr Joep Coenen, said the gesture by Vivo Energy Ghana was a true testament its partnership and sense of community spirit: “Newmont will continue to work with all our business partners in a manner consistent with our purpose of creating value and improving lives through sustainable mining” said Mr Coenen. The District Health Director, Mr Azarugo,who was full of praise to Vivo Energy Ghana for the gesture, appealed for the support of other corporate institutions to equip hospitals and clinics within the district to an appreciable standard in health care delivery. The Acting Kotoku Gyasihene and Chief of New Abirem, Obrempong Kwasi Amoh Kyeretwie said: “I am impressed with the massive infrastructure development in the district as a result of Newmont and its business partners, including Vivo Energy Ghana.” 'Planting for Food and Jobs' fertilisers being smuggled to Togo FERTILIERS MEANT for distribution to farmers in the Volta Region as part of government's Planting for Food and Jobs programme, are being smuggled to the Republic of Togo. This was disclosed by the Volta Regional Minister, Dr Archibald Yao Letsa, during the first Volta Regional Coordinating Council (VRCC) Meeting since the change of government. According to Dr Letsa, information reaching the VRCC from some districts indicates that some individuals are smuggling the fertilizers to the Republic of Togo where it costs higher, hence an avenue for undue money making for the perpetrators. The fertilisers have been highly subsidised making it cheaper to acquire by Ghanaian farmers. Under the programme, farmers are required to pay 25% of the cost of fertilizers up front and another 25% after harvesting, and the government pays off the other half (50%) as an incentive to boost agriculture in the country. "It is unfortunate that some of our fertilisers are being smuggled across to be sold in the Republic of Togo. We have had complaints from some districts." • The fertilisers have been highly subsidised making it cheaper to acquire He urged the various Municipal and District Chief Executives to see to it that the people responsible for the smuggling of the subsidised fertilisers are brought to book. "At the Regional level, the Planting for Food and Jobs programme has been rolled out in all the 25 Districts across the Region. The programme registered and distributed inputs to 9,284 farmers made up of 6,991 males and 2,293 females," said the Volta Regional Minister. However, the programme has been bedeviled by the invasion of the fall armyworm which ravaged some farms. So far about 7,165 hectares of maize farms have been affected, involving 5,128 farmers across the Region. This, Dr Letsa said, is under control. "A total of 3,892.8 liters and 107.98 kilograms of chemicals have so far been supplied to control the incidence. The agro chemicals received and distributed to the affected farmers covered about 70% of the affected farms. "There is, therefore, the need to continuously sensitize the public and establish more surveillance systems to control the outbreak."
Quake Edition 114.qxp_Layout 1 7/21/17 9:05 PM Page 8 WWW.DAILYHERITAGE.COM.GH DAILY HERITAGE MONDAY, JULY 24, 2017 11 Politics Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it — Steve Jobs 100,000 Jobs for Ghanaians; $400m in remittances in one year BY KWAKU ADDAI TARDIEH RECENTLY, YAW Osafo Maafo, Senior Minister of the Republic of Ghana stated that a 10 Billion Dollar facility Ghana arranged with China could generate about 100,000 jobs. I found it both reassuring and thought provoking. Unemployment is one of the greatest challenges in our country today. The youth sit on edge and can explode anytime out of frustration. Such is the seriousness of the situation that the Venerable Ex-President Kufuor warned of the acute unemployment situation being an imminent security crisis in Ghana, even to the extent of it being a threat to our current political dispensation. Solving this issue needs a multifaceted approach, with immediate, medium and long term strategies in mind. Thinking out of the box is necessary to help tackle this issue. We can easily generate 100,000 jobs for Ghanaians in one single year It is for this reason that I propose the easiest, lowest hanging fruit that can be used to generate employment for Ghanaian youth within 12 months. We can generate up to 100,000 jobs for Ghanaians in The Gulf Region (The UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan ), in one year, plus an inward remittance of over 400 MILLION USD per year . We do not need a loan or factories, neither do we need an expansion of government’s capacity to hire. We need just the strategic plan and Government lobbying and negotiations. Whilst it is extremely laudable for this Government to be focusing on the generation of employment via vehicles like infrastructural projects, ‘Planting for Food and Jobs,’ the revolutionary One District one Factory project etc., we should not lose sight of the fact that even these noble interventions cannot absorb the majority of unemployed Ghanaians in the short and medium term. 216 factories will be set up in the next 4 years. An average employment of 500 workers generated by each factory translates to 108,000 workers in the next 5 years when all factories may have started working. This same number can be employed in The Gulf within 1 year at almost no cost and with no brick and mortar investments. Is the Gulf safe for Ghanaian workers? Immediately one mentions the Gulf Region and jobs, many people react with repulsion and skepticism. Horror stories abound about maltreatment of housemaids and domestic workers (both true and false). There is the often repeated ignorant allegation that all Ghanaians and Africans who go to The Gulf to work are “sold and beaten or killed” and hearing this from certain quarters is unfortunate. Housemaids or domestic servants’ job is just one of over 100 job categories. The focus of this article is not on recruiting housemaids and domestic workers to The Gulf. It is focused on getting jobs in companies and organisations in The Gulf for Ghanaian youth, skilled, semi-skilled or unskilled. The Gulf is a very safe, peaceful, lucrative place to stay and work for any hardworking, serious and law abiding Ghanaian who migrates there legally and through the right channels to work for companies. Examples abound (visit www.ghgulfworkers.com where many Ghanaians in The Gulf post pictures and videos of themselves and their work and sleeping places), of tens of thousands of Ghanaians happily working and living in The UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia etc. Credible, Multi-National companies which employ 100s and sometimes 1,000s of Ghanaians in The Gulf include Almarai, McDonalds, Transguard, Petroserv, Sodexo, National Taxi, Star Security, Larsen and Toubro, China State Construction Engi- •Yaw Osafo Maafo, Senior Minister neer- ing Corporation, Qatalum, Mowasalat, Saudi Public Transport Company, Regency Group, and many more. Already there is a very high demand for Ghanaian workers, due to the reliable supply from licensed agencies, the general good behavior of the Ghanaian worker and his expertise. Gulf countries recruit mostly Anglophone Africans because English and Arabic are the languages spoken there. Following the examples of Kenya and Uganda, our government needs to lobby for Work Visa Allocations/Slots from the governments of these countries. Why the Gulf Countries in The Gulf Region are fantastically rich. The per Capita income of Qatar alone is about $145,000. Ghana’s per capita income is about $1400, which is less than 1% of that of Qatar. Same holds true for other countries in The Gulf. They are always undertaking huge projects that need a lot of human resources and labour supply. Their small population cannot provide all their human resource needs, be it highly skilled, semiskilled or unskilled labour. So they rely heavily on workers from other parts of the world; The Oceania, The Americas, Asia, Europe and Africa. The Gulf offers the highest and easiest access for Migrant Jobs. Their visa processes are fast and the demand for workers is huge. Recruit- ment to deployment can sometimes take less than a month. Unlike other parts of the developed world where the only work available through Migration Programmes target highly skilled and expert labour, The Gulf offers opportunities for all including even the uneducated or illiterate Ghanaian. With inward remittances of Migrant Workers, the Gulf has the highest percentage of remittances in respect of income to remittance ration. Various research works point to the fact that the average Asian or African Migrant Worker in The Gulf sends up to 70% of his salary back home, higher than the average Migrant Worker in Europe, America, Canada and The Oceania simply because these other locations mostly offer a pathway to citizenship which the Gulf doesn’t . Hardly will a Migrant Worker in The Gulf take a mortgage to purchase a home in The Gulf. They repatriate most of their earnings home to rather build houses and/or invest in other projects. The remittance is one big advantage to be derived from sending workers to The Gulf. How easy is it to get 100,000 job openings in one single year? Already there is a very high demand for Ghanaian workers, due to the reliable supply from licensed agencies, the general good behavior of the Ghanaian worker and his expertise. Gulf countries recruit mostly Anglophone Africans because English and Arabic are the languages spoken there. Following the examples of Kenya and Uganda, our government needs to lobby for Work Visa Allocations/Slots from the governments of these countries. Kenya recently started negotiations to secure 100,000 jobs in Saudi Arabia ALONE for semi-skilled and skilled workers ( http://www.nation.co.ke/news/Kenya -to-export-100-000-workers-to-Saudi- Arabia/1056-3891314- l3j9btz/index.html) Qatar has already offered Uganda 40,000 jobs for the year 2017 alone. These examples alone show Ghana can easily secure 100,000 jobs with some 6 or 7 countries in The Gulf with very little hustle. An average of only 15,000 jobs per country for The UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan comes to 105,000 jobs. If Kenya and Uganda can secure 100,000 and 40,000 jobs respectively from one single country in this group for one year, our 100,000 jobs target for the 7 mentioned above is very achievable. Salaries and conditions of service for gulf migrant workers Though there are Ghanaians working in various high level fields in these countries, like doctors, project engineers and consultants, oil and gas experts, university lecturers etc., most of the job opportunities in The Gulf available to Africans and Ghanaians are middle and low level jobs like construction artisans (carpenters, masons, steel fixers, plumbers, electricians etc.), labourers, cleaners, drivers, heavy machine operators, mechanics, certified security guards, hospitality staff, nurses, factory hands, etc. The average salary of a construction artisan is 1,800 Cedis, labourers, cleaners, factory hands etc earn about 1,200 Cedis. Drivers, security guards, heavy machine operators, mechanics, etc earn between 2,200 and 5.000 cedis plus. These jobs and salaries come with free hostel accommodation, free transportation to work and back, free medical care, free food or food allowance, free return ticket to Ghana for 2 months paid leave every two years etc. This is about 4-5 times higher than their earnings in Ghana, their homeland. 420 million dollars a year in remittances As stated earlier, Migrant Workers in The Gulf send an average of 70% of salaries back home. • CONTINUE ON PAGE 12
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