Dr. Segbefia Touts Mahama Reforms To Revive Industry

CAPE COAST — Aspiring NDC National Vice Chairman Dr. Edem Segbefia has positioned President John Dramani Mahama’s trade, agribusiness and industry reforms as the fulcrum of the party’s grassroots mobilization, arguing that the pivot from import dependence to value addition is already reshaping livelihoods across constituencies.

Addressing delegates in the Central Region, Segbefia painted a stark contrast between the pre-2025 landscape and the current policy direction. He said factories had shuttered, farmers were incurring losses, and markets were saturated with foreign goods. According to Ghana News Agency, Segbefia described the administration’s new doctrine as “produce in Ghana, add value in Ghana, sell to Ghana and the world,” a framework he claims is reversing decades of structural imbalance.

The reforms outlined center on industrial clustering and agricultural productivity. Government is rolling out agro-industrial parks and special economic zones to co-locate processing plants with farms, while reducing utility tariffs and prioritizing “made-in-Ghana” procurement. Priority commodities include cassava, rice, poultry, tomato, shea and oil palm, with renewed financing to halt raw exports in favor of finished goods. Complementary measures include timely distribution of subsidized fertilizer and seeds, expanded irrigation to mitigate climate shocks, and upgraded warehouses and cold rooms to curb post-harvest losses.

Segbefia further emphasized institutional support for small enterprises. He cited cheaper credit through GEXIM and the SME Fund, TVET alignment with factory needs, and trade facilitation under AfCFTA, including digitized border processes and active market penetration by GEPA and Ghanaian missions. Enforcement against smuggling and substandard imports, he argued, is designed to protect local rice, poultry and textiles while creating fiscal space for domestic manufacturers.

The political calculus is deliberate. Segbefia told grassroots members that the reforms translate directly into constituency-level gains: jobs in processing plants, guaranteed markets for farmers, and procurement opportunities for artisans and transporters. He urged cooperatives in the Upper West, North East and Upper East to organize for rice, shea and poultry value chains, and called on artisans and market women to formalize with the Registrar General to access export channels. “When a young person gets a factory job in Wa, when a woman’s shea butter is exported, that is NDC delivering,” he stated.

With the 24-Hour Economy agenda and industrial park rollout gaining traction, Segbefia concluded that the party’s economic narrative now rests on tangible production and employment outcomes. He charged NDC structures to amplify these interventions in markets, farms and palaces as evidence of governance that delivers material benefits.

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Author: Korkor Anumu