SINCE THE frequent load shedding exercise begun in August last year, Ghanaians especially students, industries and businesses have felt the impact strongly.

Even though Cape Coast does not have many industries and with it being labelled as the fifth poorest city in the country, the few businesses and people in the ancient city have complained bitterly about the exercise.

They said the exercise was collapsing the very few businesses and industries in the city.

Speaking to The Chronicle in separate interviews, Ab-Salam, the Managing Director of Ameen Sangari Industries Limited, the only factory in Cape Coast and producers of Ameen soap, said though business in the city was minimal, the company's profit margin had reduced, due to the load-shedding exercise.

He disclosed that the company loses about 1/3 of its production, making it difficult to break even.

Charity Appiawaa Smith, a hairdresser, said the exercise was retarding her business since customers who patronised her services, realizing that there was no light, detoured to other areas with light to the detriment of her business.

She disclosed that she used to make daily sales of ¢2 million before the exercise but she was now making as low as ¢ 600,000.

She appealed to government to arrange for the exercise to be carried out at night instead of the day to enable them stay in business.

A corn miller at Adisadel, a suburb in the Municipality, Kojo Ansah said the frequent power outages often damaged the motors of his milling machines, which deterred customers from coming to do business.

He said his daily account of ¢200,000 has now reduced to about ¢50,000 which he said was not sufficient to cater for his responsibilities and maintenance of his milling depot.

A visit to a number of photo laboratories in the Municipality revealed that the power outages had reduced their production rate also.

A photographer at Adom Photo Lab, Nana Akomeah said most of the photographs they print get damaged when the light goes off intermittently, resulting in loss of revenue.

He said their salaries delay due to the loss they incurred and customers sometimes threatened to take legal actions for damaging their photographs.

He also appealed to the government to come out with a solution to re-activate businesses in Cape Coast to make the city buoyant in terms of business.