The Chief Executive Officer for the Ghana Trade Fair Company, Dr Agnes Adu has stated that Cabinet has approved a master plan for the redevelopment of the Ghana International Trade Fair Centre (GITFC) in Accra.
According to her the approval would pave way for the commencement of work to transform the centre into a world exhibition centre that can host different kinds of international trade shows.
Addressing journalists in Accra yesterday as part of the bi-weekly media briefing organised by the Ministry of Information, she said management of the centre was at the implementation stage of the master plan and it would take five years for the project to be completed.
Dr Adu said the whole redevelopment of the centre would be down in three phases, stressing that, “Due to the complexities and cost involved in such development projects, we have opted for a multi-developer approach.”
This approach she explained would afford the company the opportunity to engage private developers to work on different segments of the plan using the Public Private Partnership (PPP) approach.
She said the first phase of the plan would lead to the development of a 12,000 seater convention centre, modern hotels, retail shops and amusement parks among others.
Dr Adu said available statistics indicated that the redevelopment of the centre would not boost trade for the country but also would be a major source of foreign exchange revenue for the country.
“For example on the continent, such centres exist in South Africa, Rwanda and Kenya and last year alone the amount of money generated for Rwanda alone was marvellous,” she said.
She noted that in West Africa it was only Nigeria that was trying to come out with a mixed use trade convention centre and this was targeted to boost iForeign Direct Investment.
By Cliff Ekuful
