Finances Minister Begs For Cash From Private Sectors

The Minister of Finance and Economic Planning ,Dr.Kwabena Duffour is soliciting for financial support from the private sector to finance the 2010 population and housing census.

This was held in Accra with the organized private sector ,an initiative of the government as part of its strategy to mobilize resources for the population and housing census programme this year. The meeting was aimed at engaging the private sector to deliberate on how they and the government can join hands to implement the census project.

He said the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) the agency leading the national census programme need an estimated amount of GH70 million to effectively complete the exercise and thinks the private sector should help finance the gap of about GH22 million needed for a successful  completion. ”

 

We are convinced that this gap can easily be closed from contributions from the private sector “ these requests will indeed strengthen the public and private partnerships that are needed to ensure a successful conduct of the census.

The government provided GH5 million in this years budget. This has exceeded 50 per cent of the government’s    total contribution of the entire cost of the exercise he revealed.

He noted that the financing for the programme would enable the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) partners and collaborating organization to make significant progress in the planning and implementation of this year’s census,” there is no doubt that the population and housing census is a unique data source that provides benchmark information for effective planning and good governance at all levels of governance”, he stated.

Government Statistician Dr.Grace Bediako, in a presentation said, they expect most of the preparatory work to be completed very soon to establish a firm base towards successful census cartography and the trial census among others.

She further explained that by partnering with government to successfully implement  this year census ,the private sector stands to gain in both and short and long term and that the census from the private sector needs to get to each community, each dwelling unit, each  district, each household ,each structure and each settlement before the end of the census ends.