THE 24-Hour Economy and Accelerated Export Development Secretariat under the Office of the President has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in Accra with the Hunan Architectural Design Institute Group (HADI Group) of the People’s Republic of China.
The agreement is expected to support the creation of 500,000 direct jobs through the development of a state-of-the-art industrial planning framework for the Volta Economic Corridor (VEC), alongside major infrastructural investments.
It also covers technical training and knowledge exchange between Ghanaian planning teams and engineers from the HADI Group.
Under the arrangement, both parties will collaborate on the master planning and spatial design of key development zones within the corridor.
Key areas of collaboration include park layout and infrastructure network design for agro-ecological and industrial parks, including roads, water supply systems, pipe networks, and sewage treatment facilities.
The partnership will also focus on structuring financing models to attract private capital into the project.
At the signing ceremony on Thursday, the Chairman of the HADI Group, Mr He Liu, who led the Chinese delegation, expressed the group’s commitment to Ghana’s development, noting that both sides were already connected through shared networks and mutual trust.
“We are ready to partner for the development of Ghana. Seeing the vision reflected here gives us confidence that this collaboration is built on a strong and practical foundation,” he said.
Presidential Adviser for the 24-Hour Economy and Accelerated Export Development Programme, Mr Augustus Goosie Tanoh, recalled earlier discussions that laid the foundation for the MoU during a visit to Changsha, China, in January this year.
“When we sat together in Changsha, we agreed that this relationship must be practical. Three months later, here we are,” he said.
Mr Tanoh drew parallels between Hunan’s transformation from an agrarian region into a global hub for engineering and construction and Ghana’s current development ambitions.
He stressed that careful planning was central to Hunan’s success and said Ghana was deliberately adopting the same approach.
“The institution helped plan the infrastructure that built modern Hunan. We are asking them to bring that same capability to Ghana. The work starts now,” he said.
The Volta Economic Corridor is the centrepiece of Ghana’s 24-Hour Economy Programme, which seeks to restructure how the country produces, processes, and trades.
Stretching from the port of Tema through Akosombo, across the Afram Plains, and through Yeji, Buipe, and Yapei to Tamale, the corridor is designed to become Ghana’s first net-zero green economic zone.
It will integrate more than two million hectares of arable land into agro-ecological parks, link them to industrial parks, and connect them to multimodal transport systems, all financed through structured private investment.
Renewable energy projects along the corridor are expected to reduce power costs to below seven US cents per kilowatt hour, making manufacturing more competitive.
The African Development Bank has already committed funding for feasibility studies on the transport component.
Both parties have agreed to begin with pilot projects involving two industrial parks and three agro-ecological parks along the corridor. Conceptual design work will start immediately to refine the approach before full-scale implementation across the corridor.
BY BERNARD BENGHAN
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