From Savelugu to the world: Make Northshore count
The commissioning of Northshore Apparel Ghana Limited at Savelugu in the Northern Region is more than the opening of another factory.
It is a reminder of what Ghana can achieve when finance, entrepreneurship, technology and public policy come together around production.
The facility is expected to create thousands of jobs, produce garments for local and international markets and strengthen Ghana’s export capacity.
It is supported by the Ghana Export-Import Bank (GEXIM), the Investing for Employment facility of the KfW Development Bank and equity contributions from the project promoters.
That combination of public and private capital is significant.
President John Dramani Mahama was right to describe the project as representing “hope, opportunity and the immense potential” of Ghana’s industrial sector. But the real test begins after the ceremonies.
Ghana has seen factories opened with great fanfare only for production to falter because of inadequate financing, unreliable utilities, weak markets, poor management or inconsistent government support.
Northshore Apparel must not become another such story.
The company already employs more than 2,300 people, according to recent reports, and is being developed in phases.
At full capacity, it is expected to create up to 10,000 direct jobs.
Those are not merely statistics. In a region where lack of economic opportunities has contributed to the movement of young people to the southern parts of the country, decent jobs close to home can change lives.
That is why government must ensure that the infrastructure around the factory keeps pace with its ambitions.
Roads, reliable electricity, water, digital connectivity and efficient transport are not luxuries for an industrial hub. They are necessities.
More importantly, Ghana must develop the value chain around the factory.
The plan to introduce a fabric mill and a cotton outgrower scheme offers perhaps the most exciting part of the project. Ghana should aspire to grow cotton, process it locally, manufacture garments and export finished products rather than continue to send raw materials abroad and import finished goods. The ambition should be to capture as much value as possible locally.
This is where the government’s 24-Hour Economy agenda must prove its worth. The policy cannot simply be about factories operating multiple shifts.
It must create an ecosystem in which local producers have access to finance, technology, skilled workers, markets and dependable infrastructure.
Government’s commitment to redirect GEXIM financing towards productive enterprises is therefore welcome. But financing must be disciplined, transparent and directed towards businesses capable of generating sustainable economic value.
There is also a wider lesson here. Industrialisation cannot remain concentrated around Accra and a few traditional industrial centres.
The success of Northshore Apparel could demonstrate that viable large-scale manufacturing can take place in northern Ghana.
Indeed, the Presidency has described the facility as a catalyst for restoring the region’s industrial prominence.
Government should encourage more investors to establish production facilities outside the traditional industrial corridors while providing the infrastructure and policy certainty they require.
Northshore Apparel must also be protected from political interference and treated as a national economic asset rather than a partisan achievement.
The President’s words “investment, not aid” capture the bigger challenge before Ghana.
We need investment that produces, employs, exports and builds skills.
Savelugu has given Ghana a promising beginning. The task now is to ensure that the promise becomes a durable industrial success story.
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