The Ghana Export Promotion Authority (GEPA) has initiated activities to ensure that the new export strategy of achieving five billion dollars for Non-Traditional Export (NTE) sector is achieved by 2017.

Mr Gideon Quarcoo, Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Export Promotion Authority, said building the capacity of exporters to meet international requirements, especially in the area of phytosanitary and providing exposure to their products through support for their participation in trade fairs were part of the activities.

He was speaking at the launch of Ghana’s participation in the Sixth China Yiwu Forest Products International Fair scheduled for November 2013 in China’s export-oriented city of Yiwu. The fair is expected to give Ghana the opportunity to showcase her products to the Asian market.

Mr Quarcoo said the Authority had made the efforts to transform the small-scale industry sector to ensure that it contributed effectively and efficiently in fulfilment with the national strategy. He expressed optimism that the national export strategy would ensure a boost in the country’s non-traditional exports.

Under the strategy 212 districts in the country are required to identify at least one significant commercial viable agro-based export product to help achieve the target. Mr Quarcoo said the strategy also aimed at generating considerable number of jobs and improving incomes as well as the standard of living and welfare of the people.

He said the strategy would help strengthen and resource export development related institutions to ensure that the export culture was imbibed nationwide to avoid the dependence on traditional exports.

The national strategy for the non-traditional export sector, which spans from 2013 to 2017, aims at putting Ghana on the global map as a world class exporter of competitive products and services. The GEPA in July announced that Ghana's NTEs earnings fell by 2.43 per cent to $ 2.364 billion in 2012 compared with $ 2.423 billion in 2011.

The situation was attributed to factors including the drop in the average price levels of some key products including cashew nuts, cocoa paste and canned tuna. Cashew nuts’ contribution to earnings dipped by 16 per cent, cocoa paste 11 per cent and canned tuna 33 per cent.

Unfavourable cross-border trade in cashew nuts with neighbouring countries including Cote d’Ivoire and Burkina Faso was another factor. Mr Quarcoo expressed optimism that despite the decline in NTE earnings, the target for 2013 which is $ 3.3 billion was achievable.

He called for aggressive export promotion and development by GEPA in collaboration with other key export stakeholders.

Cocoa paste, cocoa butter, canned tuna, plastic products, cashew nuts, natural rubber sheets, veneers, raw cotton lint, lubricating oil and aluminium sheets, plates and coils were the ten leading NTE products that traded in 2011 and 2012.

Togo, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Cote d’Ivoire, Benin, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Guinea and Liberia are the top 10 NTE markets in the Economic Community of West African States.