SADA back on track – President Mahama

President John Mahama says the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) was back on track and will be the vehicle to promote investment in the savannah regions for development.

President Mahama said this in Tamale last Saturday when he visited the ongoing 20th Ghana International Trade Fair in Tamale to see products exhibited as well as interact with exhibitors, who were local and international business operators, as part of efforts to boost investment in the SADA zone.

This year’s event, which began on February 25, and ends on March 7, is organized by the Ghana Trade Fair Company in collaboration with SADA on the theme: “Two Decades in International Trade Fairs in Ghana: Exploring Business Opportunities in the SADA Zone of Ghana”.

President Mahama said SADA had been accountable as well as building bridges with all including international partners necessary to promote investment in the savannah regions of the country.

He said SADA had developed a comprehensive document, which was an analysis of investment opportunities in all the districts within the savannah zone, saying the government had been using the document to woo investors into the SADA region.

He expressed confidence in the new leadership of SADA to work to position the SADA region as a gateway to the Sahelian region.

Mr Thomas Abanga, Chief Executive Officer of A&G Agro-Mechanical Industries, an indigenous company, which is one of the exhibitors at the fair, spoke about his company’s plans to set up an assembling plant in Tamale this year to assemble tractors, farm implements and other agricultural services to enhance mechanization agriculture in the country.

Some of the products exhibited by A&G Agro-Mechanical Industries at the fair included boom sprayers, disc harrows, fertilizer spreaders, leveling bars, till planters, water pumps and hoses, and ton trailers, tractor ploughs, and multi-purpose threshers.

Mr Abanga said A&G Agro-Mechanical Industries had partnered with the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) in the Region to set up the assembling plant at its (MoFA) Agricultural Mechanization Center in Tamale.

He said the goal of the project was to bring agricultural mechanization to the country to ensure sustainable agricultural production whiles creating jobs for the people in fulfilment of the government’s agricultural policy objectives as contained in the Medium Term Agricultural Sector Improvement Programme (METASIP).

He said A&G Agro-Mechanical Industries, which is also the sole distributer of agromaster implements in West Africa, would partner with renowned manufacturers of agricultural implements to ensure technology transfer through buying of old and spoilt tractors and rehabilitating them for use on farms.

He mentioned some of the partners of A&G Agro-Mechanical Industries as agromaster, based in Turkey, V.S.T Power Tillers and Tractors Limited, based in India, Hoyu Gongyi Hongyun Machinery, based in China, ICS Terradonis, based in France and Global Meccanica, based in Pakistan.

Mr Abanga called for closer collaboration between the private sector and the state to promote agriculture in the country.

SOURCE: GNA