The maiden edition of the National Trade Facilitation Awards 2016 is to be held on Saturday July 23, 2016 at the Kempinski Hotel in Accra.

The Awards to be held under the theme: “Enhancing efficient and effective trade practices to promote growth,” is jointly organised by the Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Ghana Community Network Services Limited (GCNet) to recognise the contribution of players in the sector.

The Awards will target 36 Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) which issue permits, licenses, and exemptions through the e-MDA portal and freight forwarding agencies in Ghana.

To sustain interest in the awards and ensure that as many freight forwarders as possible are awarded, the freight forwarders are divided into two categories; big freight forwarders and small freight forwarders.

Mr. Emmanuel Darko, the Deputy General Manager, GCNet, said the maiden 2016 awards would be based on actual performances and achievements in 2015 and would focus on criteria such as compliance to set rules, revenue generation, time to completion of document processing and actual release of documents and transaction volumes.

The annual Trade Facilitation Awards Scheme is expected to be a competitive barometer that would spur on trade facilitation actors to achieve excellence in efficient service provision.