(Special for CAFS) Ghanaian industries threaten lay-offs due to energy crisis

The Association of Ghana Industries ( AGI) has warned of possible "massive layoffs" as a result of the country's worsening energy crisis, local media reported here Wednesday.

For more than two-and-a-half years now, Ghana has experienced erratic power supplies, resulting in the rationing of electricity supply to consumers.

The country's power producers Electricity Company of Ghana ( ECG), Ghana Grid Company (Gridco) and the Volta River Authority ( VRA) have promised to make concessions for industries to survive.

However, the industries say they will have to send some workers home as the power crisis is keeping them pressed.

Speaking to local JoyNews, the president of the Ghana Chamber of Commerce and Industries, Seth Adjei Baah, said the industries were not generating enough to keep them in business.

He stated: "We are expanding to rural areas. Due to that demand and supply do not match and it is affecting the industries."

He said production had decreased due to the frequent power cuts and the industries had nothing to supply to their customers.

"If you are not able to get electricity to run, production goes down. And without the production, you have nothing to sell, even to pay for your bills, your raw material and even your workers."

"And even if your workers are stationed without working, at the end of the month you cannot say they did not work so you are not going to pay them," he explained.

He regretted the industries' decision but declared: "If you are not breaking even, the best thing is to lay-off because you want to cut down cost and we have started laying off people."

"It is not easy to look at somebody you have worked with over the years and say to him, go home because I cannot afford to keep you."

Baah noted that the power cuts had become so worse that they received four hours of electrical power a day, which he said, was not enough to enable them to break even with production.

"Fueling generator sets and other expenses for production is expensive and cannot meet the market pricing," he added.

He revealed that 48 percent of workers within his establishment had been laid off and more were expected to follow.

"I think more will go because we cannot continue to pick up a lot of bills when we are not making money."

He debunked information that priority of power supply were given to industries, indicating that no formal notice had been given them to that effect.

"I don't know how they are going to do that because in this country, the industries are scattered. We don't have organized industrial areas like they have in other countries (areas). So how do you just identify the industries within the country and give power to them?"

The layoffs, according Baah, had no specific time frame since they also did not know when the power crisis would end.

"Business people are in for profit so long as we cannot break even because of power shortages, we keep on cutting down cost until we are sure that we will keep our heads above waters," he added.

Touching on the issue, Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry Ibrahim Murtala Mohammed said the government understood the plight of the industry and was doing everything to bring the situation under control.

He said the issue of the industries not located at one place was a major hindrance to giving special attention to them. Endite