GHANA BUSINESS ECONOMY AND INFRASTRUCTURE NEWS.

[obeeme]

Ghana is set to sign an agreement with Canada to support the expansion of the Aboadze Thermal plant in Takoradi. The expansion will add a further 132 megawatts of power to the thermal power generation capacity.

President John Evans Atta Mills who held discussions on the plant with the Canadian Commercial Corporation (CCC) last November in Canada, has consequently welcomed executives of the Corporation to Ghana, commending the enormous Canadian assistance to Ghana’s development.

The CCC executives led by Mr Marc Whittington, are in the country to sign an agreement with the Government of Ghana to support the expansion of the Aboadze Thermal Plant.

The agreement is the second pact to be signed after the first expansion project which has the capacity to generate an additional 132 megawatts on completion.

The second expansion project is also expected to generate 132 megawatts to boost the plant’s capacity.

President Mills expressed appreciation to the group for the continuous support for Ghana when he welcomed the delegation from Canada, stressing that the Government values its partnership with the CCC.

He said he was impressed about the high interest of Canadian investors in Ghana and assured them of a congenial business atmosphere.

Mr. Whittingham lauded the progress of the Ghanaian economy, indicating that the Corporation acknowledges the huge business potential in Ghana. He said CCC is supporting the second expansion plan for the thermal plant due to its importance to the economy.

According to him, the CCC recognised electricity production as a critical instrument to economic development, and that there was a need to support that sector to create jobs.

[obeeme]

Ghana’s economic freedom has scored an overall score of 60.7, making it the 84th freest worldwide out of 179 countries, according to the 2012 Index of Economic Freedom released by the American Heritage Foundation in partnership with the Wall Street Journal.

Ghana, the world’s second-largest producer of cocoa, was ranked 9th out of 46 countries in the sub-Saharan Africa region, and its overall score has risen above both the world average (59.5) and regional average of 53.7. Mauritius topped the region with 77 points.

Ghana’s overall score was 1.3 points better than last year (2011) and was “due to improvements in four of the 10 freedoms including labor freedom and monetary freedom” the report said.

Recording one of the 20 largest score improvements in the 2012 Index, the conductors of the report commented “Ghana has become a “moderately free” economy.”

With a five-point increase in economic freedom since 2006, it argues that the economy has been growing at an average rate of 6% per year. “A vibrant private sector, benefitting from macroeconomic stability and ongoing reforms, has contributed to the economic expansion,” the report adds.

[obeeme]

The Ghana National Petroleum Corporation has completed lifting its second consignment of crude oil form the Jubilee Field.

Ghana last year earned a little over $444 million from the sale of four lifting’s, Joy News has learnt.

In all, the Jubilee Field partners have lifted a little over 10 million barrels for Q1.

Meanwhile the country has been able to save 69 million dollars from the revenues earned from crude oil sales last year. $14.4 million has been put aside for future generations in the heritage fund, while $58 million has accrued to the Stabilization Fund to cushion the country in times of price volatility.

[obeeme]

Madrid-based Airline, Iberia, is set to begin scheduled flight from Accra to Madrid from July this year.

The airline will however start its operations in partnership with British Airways which merged with Iberia in 2010.

Ghana’s commercial manager for British Airways James Wooldridge told Joy Business they will offer seamless travelling experience to their passengers.

He added that Iberia hopes to capitalize on the structures of British Airways to reduce their cost of operations

About 40 airlines could be operating from the Kotoka International Airport by the close of this year as four international airlines are due to start operations. They include: China Eastern Airlines, Qatar Airways, Air Canada and Royal Jorda

[obeeme]

THE AGRICULTURAL Development Bank (ADB) posted a profit-before-tax of GH¢51.1 million at the end of December 2011, marking a significant increase in its restated 2010 position of GH¢12.8 million.

This was as a result of a considerable expansion in the balance sheet of the bank, which witnessed a significant rise in assets from GH¢968.2 million at the end of December 2010 to GH¢1,213.7 million at the end of December 2011 – a growth of 25.4 percent.

The bank’s major earning assets included loans and advances that shot up from GH¢577.0 million to GH¢678.6 million, registering a growth rate of 17.6 percent.

Also, the bank made impressive strides in resource mobilization during the 2011 financial year, and that provided a major boost to the expansion of its assets base.

“Customer deposits grew significantly from GH¢536.1 million to GH¢827.7 million, registering a growth of 54.4 percent during the period. This resulted from the pragmatic strategic initiatives the bank has been implementing since 2010, thus responding to customer needs and providing attractive, quality and efficient customer service,” Steve Kpordzih, Managing Director of ADB revealed.

He continued that as evidence of its strength during the year under review, ADB transferred a further GH¢25.0 million from its income surplus account to its stated capital account, increasing its capital from GH¢50.0 million to GH¢75.0 million. Mr Kpordzih said this enabled ADB to fully comply with the regulatory minimum capital requirement of GH¢60 million ahead of the December 2012 deadline given by the Bank of Ghana for full compliance by indigenous banks.

“In the area of agricultural financing, ADB made several significant financing arrangements for the sector in the year 2011. The agricultural sector had total new lending amounting to GH¢141.7 million compared to GH¢100.1 million in 2010. The bank also made considerable new interventions in the productive agro-processing sub-sector and invested a total of GH¢84.5 million.

“Another significant development during the year under review was the completion of the upgrading of the branch and head office operations onto flexcube universal banking system (UBS) – version 11.2 banking software to support our corporate, retail, credit and treasury operations. The new IT infrastructure, systems and processes of ADB have enhanced the quality and efficiency of our customer service delivery. ADB has also added visa card processing to its cocktail of e-banking services.” he noted.

According to the MD, the release of the 2011 financial results of ADB was against the backdrop of the decision by its management to restate the 2010 accounts of the bank to make provision for transactions and balances which have been outstanding in the bank’s records for several years, some as far back as 2002.

“The financial out-turn achieved in 2011 will positively influence the strategic agenda of ADB to list on the Ghana Stock Exchange in 2012.”

[obeeme]

South African Bank, FirstRand says it is about to finalize a deal to enter Ghana and Nigerian markets.

The Group CEO of the Bank Sizwe Nxasana made the comment in Mumbai, India this week as FirstRand opened a unit in that country. There were earlier merger talks between FirstRand Bank and Merchant bank to expand its operations in Ghana.

It is unclear though whether earlier reports that talks between the two banks had broken down, have been rectified or not.

The Group CEO Mr Nxasana in his statements said the bank is exploring opportunities for both acquisitions and new licences in Ghana and Nigeria.

Analysts have previously said the group could either buy one of the banks rescued by the Nigerian central bank when it injected $4bn in 2009 into troubled banks as part of a reform of the country’s banking sector, or FirstRand could start a greenfield project as it has done in new markets such as Zambia and Tanzania.

FirstRand’s entry into the Nigerian retail market, where rival Standard Bank is already a major player, will atone for its failure last year to buy Nigeria’s Sterling Bank after disagreement on price.

It is believed the deal would have cost up to $400m.**

[Naijaborn]

Ghana Tema oil refinery shuts down on lack of crude

Ghana's 45,000 barrel-per-day state-run Tema oil refinery has shut its main crude distillation unit since April 11 after running out of feedstock, sources told Reuters on Thursday.

"The plant is down because we do not have crude to process - the last activity at the plant was on April 11 at 1630 GMT," a source at the plant's labour union said.

Ghana's National Petroleum Authority (NPA), which regulates petroleum downstream operations, confirmed the plant had shut down, but dismissed suggestions it was the cause of this week's fuel shortage.

Some petrol stations in the capital Accra and in Tema areas reported supply delays this week, blaming the situation on the refinery's shutdown.

"We are aware TOR (the refinery) has shut down temporarily in April, but that has nothing to do with the shortages in some areas - the shortage has to do with a little challenge at one of our major depots," said NPA spokesman Yaro Kasambata.

Kasambata said he did not know the reason for the shutdown.

"It could either be for maintenance or lack of crude oil, but all I know is that the plant is not processing crude at the moment," he said.

He said Ghana relied heavily on private suppliers to import finished products to make up for Ghana's daily requirement of 90,000-100,000 barrels daily, almost double what Tema produces.

The Tema refinery has been hobbled by repeated shortages in available crude since 2008, when its main lender Ghana Commercial Bank cut off support due to unpaid debts totalling $600 million.

Ghana's government repaid the debt to the bank early last year, but officials said the refinery still remained indebted to some bulk oil suppliers.

Ghana is Africa's newest crude oil exporter after starting up its offshore Jubilee field. But authorities have said the country's sole refinery needed an upgrade to be able to run the domestically produced oil.

The Tema plant currently relies on crude imports, mostly from Nigeria.

http://www.abndigital.com/page/news/...-lack-of-crude

[Naijaborn]

This is really shocking news..... Ghana, wassup, with all that Jubilee field, crude Oil??

[ngantsop]

I'm so surprise...!!! It really happens in Ghana ???

[obeeme]

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ACCRA (Reuters) - Ghana's state-run 45,000 barrel-per-day Tema Oil Refinery will resume crude processing by Monday, the plant's managing director said on Thursday, following a two-week shutdown.

"We are set to start processing this weekend - we believe that (at the) latest by Monday, TOR should be in production," Ato Ampiah told Reuters.

Ampiah said the plant had undergone an upgrade to its boilers to allow them to run on gas instead of oil.

"It's a big turn around and we expect this upgrade to save the refinery millions of dollars a month," Ampiah said.

He added that the refinery had purchased 630,000 barrels of crude oil, meaning feedstock was on hand for the restart, and that another 200,000-barrel shipment would arrive to the refinery by next week.

Sources close to the plant's labour union told Reuters the plant had been shut since April 11 due to lack of crude.

The Tema refinery has been hobbled by repeated shortages in available crude since 2008, when its main lender Ghana Commercial Bank cut off support due to unpaid debts totalling $600 million.

Ghana's government repaid the debt to the bank early last year, but officials said the refinery still remained indebted to some bulk oil suppliers.

Ampiah said that by June, the refinery would have the capacity to produce high octane petroleum as part of plans to increase its expand its profitability. Currently, Ghana imports high octane fuel and other complex refined products.

Ghana is Africa's newest crude oil exporter after starting up its offshore Jubilee field. But authorities have said the Tema refinery needed an overhaul to be able to run the domestically produced oil.
..

[obeeme]

Kosmos Energy (NYSE: KOS - News) announced results from the Teak-4A appraisal well, located in the West Cape Three Points Block, offshore Ghana. Located 6.1 kilometers (3.8 miles) northwest of the Teak-1 discovery well, the Teak-4A well was targeting the stratigraphic extension of the Teak discovery area. The well encountered thin, non-commercial reservoirs and is being plugged and abandoned. Kosmos and partners have begun integrating well results into the Teak field model to determine forward appraisal and development plans.

The Atwood Hunter rig drilled Teak-4A to a total depth of 2,850 meters (9,348 feet) in water depth of 554 meters (1,817 feet). Following the completion of operations at the Teak-4A well, the drilling rig will set gauges at the Teak-2A well and perform a drill stem test at the Akasa oil discovery on the West Cape Three Points Block.

Kosmos Energy is the operator of the West Cape Three Points Block with a 30.875 percent interest. The Company’s partners include Anadarko Petroleum Corporation (30.875 percent), Tullow Oil plc (26.396 percent), Sabre Oil & Gas Holdings Ltd. (1.854 percent), and the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (10 percent carried).

[ability11]

Renaissance Group to build two cities in Ghana


A multi-national company, the Renaissance Group, is to build two townships, one at Appolonia in Dodowa and the other at Asakae in Takoradi, beginning from the fourth quarter of this year.

The townships will involve residential, commercial and industrial buildings with educational and health facilities. The company will also construct roads and provide water for the townships.

Each township, to be funded solely by the Renaissance Group, is to take about 65,000 people.

The Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Renaissance Group, Mr Stephen Jennings, made this known during a courtesy call on the Vice-President, Mr John Dramani Mahama, at the Castle, Osu, Tuesday.

Mr Jennings and a business delegation were at the Castle to brief Mr Mahama on developments regarding the project.

The Renaissance Group, which is into capital investment, has invested more than $200 billion in various projects across the world.

Mr Jennings said his outfit had completed the master plan and indicated that the sod-cutting ceremony for the commencement of the projects would be held soon.

He stressed that all the funding for the project was coming from the group and that the company wanted the government’s support to make the project a reality.

On technology transfer, he said the group was partnering with technical institutions in Takoradi to enhance the skills of artisans who would work on the project.

Mr Jennings said apart from discussions with government officials, the company was also talking with traditional rulers in the two areas to ensure smooth execution of the project.

In his response, the Vice-President noted that the cities were getting congested, with 53 per cent of Ghana’s population living in urban areas.

He said the increased number of people in the cities was putting much pressure on the limited facilities and indicated that the government was trying to ease the pressure in the cities through the building of more facilities.

Therefore, he said, the construction of the townships in Dodowa and Takoradi was timely, noting that the population in Takoradi would increase because of the oil operations.

Mr Mahama said Ghana was open to business and asked investors to continue to have confidence in the country and not hesitate to invest in its economy.

He said they should not be discouraged by the increased political rhetoric in this election year and gave an assurance that the country was going to have peaceful and successful elections.

The Vice-President again assured investors that the government would not overspend in this election year, explaining that doing that might disturb the macroeconomic gains.

source
http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePag...&comment=0#com

[obeeme]

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The Ghana Investments Promotion Centre (GIPC) recorded a total of 95 new projects with an estimated value of $1.8 billion for the first quarter of 2012. This represents an increase of 67.98 percent compared to the value recorded in the same quarter of 2011.

The Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) component of the estimated value of the newly-registered projects amounted to 979.85 million while the total initial capital transfers for the quarter amounted to $43.27 million.

George Aboagye, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of GIPC, who made these known to the media in Accra, said the USA, with an FDI value of $407 million, ranked first while China registered more projects.

He said of the 95 projects registered, 52, representing 54.17 percent were wholly-foreign owned enterprises valued at GH¢422.77 million while the remaining 43 projects were joint ventures between Ghanaians and foreign partners and valued at GH¢1.29 billion.

The total foreign equity was GH536.19 million and the initial equity transfers was GH¢73.57 million. It is expected that 4,468 jobs will be created from the projects registered.

According to Mr Aboagye, the centre embarked on re-registration of companies about two years ago. This formed part of GIPC’s monitoring and evaluation strategies of investment activities in the country.

“These companies have created 43,923 actual jobs from the registered projects, 2,532 jobs of which are for non-Ghanaians. At the time of the initial registration with the centre, a total of 24,028 jobs were expected to be created. The current investment at the time of the re-registration by the companies is $982.91 million.”

[obeeme]

Destination Inspection Company BIVAC International is calling on government to institute harsher sanctions against importers who use fraudulent means or documents to clear goods.

This, according to the Deputy Managing Director should serve as a deterrent for potential perpetrators. Fred Mac Bruce said this is crucial in addressing complaints of importers about delays in the clearance process at the ports.
He was speaking to Joy Business at a seminar to educate stakeholders on processes of acquiring their final classification and valuation report.
“There are delays in the process because when you raise a query on suspected invoices, you ask the importer to come and explain. It takes forever for them to come and explain. That’s obviously delays the issuing of a Final Classification and Valuation Report (FCVR)” he explained.

“And then when you are not there they turn around to accuse you of frustrating them. I can tell you we’ve given a lot of information to Customs.If you are an importer or trader in the European Union, you dare not because just one single attempt and you will be out of business forever” he added.

[obeeme]

Credit Referencing Company, Dun and Bradstreet, D & B has finally received its full operational license from the Bank of Ghana. The company therefore joins the pioneer bureau, XDS Data and the second, Hudson Price Data Solutions as the 3rd credit Reference Bureau in the country.

Country Director, Evans Sarpong confirmed to JOY BUSINESS, their full operational licence was granted last Friday after meeting all the requirements by the Central Bank.

“We have the entire infrastructure and data centre in place. The delay basically had to do with some information the Bank of Ghana needed from us for which we provided. So now that we have the license, we are going to officially launch our operations anytime soon. From today we’re going start engaging the banks and obviously start collating data within the next couple of months.

A credit bureau provides information on the credit repayment trends of individuals and companies. This allows financial institutions to make inquiries on a consumer or commercial entity before approving any form of credit or deciding on whether to sustain the credit granted. Credit bureaus aggregate information among participating financial institutions to provide the credit decision-maker with a more complete risk profile to enhance their risk mitigation capabilities, he noted.

Dun and Bradstreet was granted a provisional license last year and planned to launch its operations before the end of the year. Mr. Sarpong however says they are however unfazed by any negative implications of the apparent delay.

“We appreciate that we coming on board at this time may give our competitors a bit of an edge but we believe that we have what it takes to add value to this credit bureau business in Ghana with our reputation as one of the major international credit bureau operators. So we’re not perturbed by having our competitors already taking the lead because we know what we’re bring on board” he added.

Credit bureaus will provide financial institutions with a better risk management tool and the bank customers will be better evaluated on their credit worthiness. From the experience of credit bureaus in other countries, it was found that over time, borrowers stand to benefit from faster credit applications processing, faster disbursement of loans, fairer assessment and better adjusted quantum according to their more informed assessments..

“D&B is pleased to launch business operations in Ghana and will work on creating a sustainable financial infrastructure in Ghana. Our experience with government and private credit bureaus across the world has facilitated us in building this robust bureau for Ghana”. D&Bs’ Executive Vice President, Miguel Llenas, also said. .

[obeeme]

Shareholders of UT Bank have dispelled claims that continuous investments by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) have diluted their shares and power of ownership of the bank.

The IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, last week invested 15 million dollars in the bank.

The IFC again on Tuesday facilitated an additional capital injection of a 15 million dollars Trade Finance Guarantee Facility to UT Bank.

With these injections, the IFC now has 22% ownership of the bank.

[obeeme]

Data and internet is the future of telecoms in Africa and remains a veritable tool that will drive socio-economic development on the Continent, Chief Operating Officer of Glo Mobile Ghana, George Andah has said.

According to Andah, Glo Mobile Ghana has invested in cutting-edge technology that provides customers with jet-speed internet and data services with nationwide coverage, making it the only operator that has the widest and fastest data network coverage in the country.

“The presence of Glo in Ghana will create a lot of excitement among the stakeholders and unleash potentials for economic and social development of the country.

With the state-of-the-art network that is technically structured to offer seamless connections, we guarantee high quality voice and data network service that is comparable to any network in the world. We believe that this will accelerate the social and economic growth in the country.”

Glo Mobile Ghana, has made robust investment on network infrastructure that will drive premium service offerings such as speed of uploads and downloads as well as flexible and convenient data bundling for its different consumer segments, he said.

Its network boasts of the latest broadband technology such as Next Generation Networks, 1,400 state-of-the-art Base Transceiver Stations (BTS), four ultra modern Switches and 18 Base Switching Centres (BSC).

Transmission of calls and data on these systems will be back-boned by the high-capacity Glo 1 submarine fibre-optic ring cable covering 3,100 kilometres across the length and breadth of Ghana.

“All these have the capacity to carry traffic for up to 10 million lines at a time,” said Andah, adding that “the network has planned to increase its BTS to 2,300 by the end of 2012, which will position it as the number one operator in network coverage in Ghana”

Source: GNA

[obeeme]

UT Bank closed 2011 without paying dividends to its shareholders but it secured a total of $55.4million from a number of reputable international financiers to position the bank strongly for a better performance.

The bank could not pay dividends because it had to complete the payment of the GH¢60 million minimum capital to the Bank of Ghana as required for every bank operating in Ghana.

UT secured a $15 million loan from the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the African Capitalization Fund Limited to finish paying the minimum deposit at the BOG, but it secured more than that amount.

CEO of the Bank, Prince Kofi Amoabeng reported at this year’s Annual General Meeting that it also secured a $10 million trade credit line, and $5 million senior loan from the IFC to help facilitate UT’s small and medium-scale enterprise (SME) business.

“We have also successfully negotiated a long-term loan of eight million Euros ($10.4 million) from the European Investment Bank (EIB). This will help us fund projects that have a longer maturity period,” he said.

Prince Kofi Amoabeng said UT also planned to conclude negotiations for a further $10 million equity investment from a reputable European organization by the close of this year, 2012.

He said with the support from the IFC, the bank had now exceeded the GH¢60 million minimum capital to GH¢80 million, and was now poised to perform better and pay dividends in 2013.

Meanwhile, the bank posted some GH¢17.3 million profit before tax, and a little over GH¢13 million profit after tax.

The bank finished the year with total assets worth GH¢712.9 million, 26% return on equity, which was higher than the annual treasury-bill rate. It gave out GH¢408 millioin in loans in 2011, which was almost twice what it gave out in 2010.
Mr. Amoabeng however reported that the bank finished the year with a loan portfolio of GH¢499 million, which was 45% higher than that of 2010, adding that SMEs got 57% of the total loans disbursed within the year and the remaining 43% went to the corporate sector.

The bank also undertook a number of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) projects including financial literacy programmes with GIZ, grooming of up and coming entrepreneurs with Enablis Business Launchpad and the breast cancer awareness campaign and support to acquire a mobile pre-screening unit.

Board Chairman of the bank, Joseph Nsonamoah assured shareholders “the bank is moving up the ladder in terms of market position…and our underlying results show the strength and promise of the bank in achieving its goals.”

[obeeme]

Zeal Environmental Technologies Limited (ZETL) is establishing a modern oilfields integrated waste management facility at Nyankrom in the Shama District of Ghana.

Mr. Kweku Ennin, Chief Executive Officer of the company announced this on Tuesday when briefing the media who visited the facility to acquaint themselves with the operations of the company.

Mr. Ennin said the company has acquired a 12.5 acre land for the development of the facility and 6.5 acres of the land has been used to develop the integrated waste management facility.

He said a modern Oily Waste Water Separating Plant, which can be used to manage gas condensate and other hydrocarbon liquid waste is being operated at the facility.

Mr Ennin said ZETL has also acquired a modern high temperature hazardous waste incinerator to manage hazardous waste such as oily rage and sacks, used oil and fuel filters, chemical sacks, obsolete chemicals, medical waste, paint cans and used paints.

He said the company handles ship generated oily waste water, oily sludge, waste oils and general garbage from all vessels that call at the Takoradi Port, the Sekondi Naval Base and the oil and gas industry as well as rigs in the West Africa sub-region.

Mr. Ennin said ZETL is “Committed to ensuring safe, high quality life and environmentally friendly health society for today’s population and tomorrow’s generation”.

Source: GNA

[obeeme]

American oil firm Kosmos Energy on May 3, 2012 terminated the acquisition agreement to buy Sabre Oil’s 4.05% interest in the Deepwater Tano Block, offshore Ghana.

The termination was effected after both parties reached a “mutual agreement”.

“Kosmos Energy…has reached a mutual agreement with Sabre Oil & Gas Holdings Ltd. (Sabre) to terminate the acquisition by Kosmos of Sabre’s participating interest in the Deepwater Tano Block, offshore Ghana,” the company said in a statement.

Kosmos on February 27, 2012 announced it has exercised the right under the existing Joint Operating Agreement to acquire the participating interest of Sabre in the DWTB for a purchase price estimated at approximately $365 million.

Kosmos expected to seal the deal in the second quarter of 2012 subject to a definitive transaction agreement, customary closing conditions and necessary government approvals.

Now that the transaction has failed to materialize, Kosmos’ interest in the Deepwater Tano Block remains at 18% with Tullow Oil plc (49.95%), Anadarko Petroleum Corporation (18%), Sabre Oil & Gas Holdings Ltd. (4.05%), and the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (10% carried interest).