Accra, Sept. 21, GNA - Japan has given a positive response to a pledge it made at the Tokyo International Conference on Africa's Development in May this year to double private sector investment on the continent by 2012. Towards this end, a 38-member Japanese trade and investment mission is in Ghana to explore business opportunities in the agriculture, trade, services and manufacturing sectors. In 2006, Ghana exported 72.6 million dollars worth of goods while she imported 120.95 million dollars.

Also, Japanese private sector investment in Ghana over the last 14 years stands at 13.9 million dollars. Mrs. Gifty Ohene-Konadu, Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry, said the visit of the delegation should provide the opportunity to enhance trade and investment needed to reverse the imbalance between the two countries. She said, to attract Foreign Direct Investment; the government had been undertaking pro-business reform initiatives and programme interventions to improve the business environment.

Some of these initiatives include, simplifying and reducing the time and cost of business registration, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, registering property and protecting investors. The Ghanaian economy, Mrs. Ohene-Konadu said, offered real opportunities for businesses either wholly foreign-owned or joint ventures in the areas of agro-processing and agri-business such as processing of tropical fruits and vegetables for the local export markets, processing of grains and vegetable oils.

Opportunities also exist in seafood processing, craft and handicraft, mining and the energy sectors. "Ghana is indeed, a market ripe for profit making and provides an attractive package of trade and investment opportunities, in an environment of political stability and tranquillity," she added. Mr Yasutoshi Nishimura, Head of Joint Mission for Promoting Trade and Investment to Central and West Africa, said the visit was the first step to follow up commitments to deepen relations with the African continent.

He said Ghana's steady economic growth and political stability were a major attraction for the choice of the country as one of the destinations of the Mission.

Mr Nishimura expressed the hope that the joint mission would boost bilateral trade and investment as well as deepen cooperative relations between the two countries.