Fighting Against PFC Fish Meal

…Says It Cannot Be Roped Into Sinister Moves
Corporate Social Responsibility Movement (CSRM), an organization purporting to champion responsible corporate citizenship, based in Tema, which is leading the onslaught against the establishment of a fish meal plant at Pioneer Food Cannery (PFC), has been dealt with a serious blow from the Ghana Trades Union Congress (GTUC) when it attempted to rope that outfit in its dirty scheme of affairs.
CSRM, The Enquirer learnt from flawless multiple sources at the GTUC, sought to portray PFC as having manipulated its union to agree to the establishment of the fish meal.
CSRM has made things to look as if it is fighting against the establishment of the plant because of its danger, but rather it has turned out that it is doing bidding for two other companies which were previously obtaining their raw materials from the PFC for the fish meal plants.
After failing to impress on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to stop PFC from establishing the fish meal, CSRM moved to the GTUC with loads of reasons why that outfit should step in and prevent the PFC from embarking on the project.
However, it could not succeed this time too because the GTUC was at sea as to why it should be part of such moves.
The Executive Secretary of the CSRM, Mr. Richster Nii Amarh Amarfio, The Enquirer gathered from sources within the GTUC, was simply thrown out after he failed to convince officials about his motivation for trying to botch the PFC project.
“The man wanted us to believe that the PFC has gagged its workers over the establishment of the fish meal but we are not in position to buy that idea,” the sources said.
The sources said: “Once the workers are comfortable with their conditions and other stakeholders do have any problem, we don’t come in at all,” the sources said.
CSRM is fighting on behalf of Ghana Protein and Magydom Enterprise, both operators of fish meal plants, which hitherto were obtaining their raw materials from the PFC.
Mr. Amarfio, in a letter to the EPA earlier, stated that the PFC sells 70% of offal and fish waste as raw materials to Ghana Protein and 30% to Magydom Enterprise, both local companies with huge investments, in the estimation of the CSRM.
He said in the letter that was protesting against the PFC- proposed fish meal the establishment of such a plant would deny the two companies basic raw materials and force them to fold up.
The CSRM Executive Secretary, in doing the bidding for the two companies, said that the number of workers to be engaged by the PFC was nowhere near that of the two companies.
Mr. Amarfio’s gymnastics came into full play when he proposed in his letter that an inter-sectoral meeting to address the concerns of PFC in relation with trade ties with the existing partners is convened as a matter of urgency under the auspices of the Ministries of Food and Agriculture and Trade and Industry, adding that the CSRM will be willing to facilitate such meeting when provided with the requisite support.
He went further to call on the EPA to take immediate steps to halt all activities in relation to the proposed fish meal plant at PFC.
According to him, the CSRM is not against the expansion of investment by PFC in Ghana but the intended project would be detrimental to the drive at attracting investors, as the plant would deny other investors the required raw materials.