Don't renege on the tariff reduction policy!

 Don't renege on the tariff reduction policy! The Finance Minister, Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta, announced in Parliament last Wednesday during the presentation of the 2018 Budget that residential and non-residential electricity consumers in the country will benefit from a 13% tariff reduction beginning in January of next year. Moreover, other composite charges in the levy development of power have been decreased by the public authority.

The decrease in power duties, as contained in the 2018 Financial plan, are: residential – as much as 13%; 13 percent are non-residential; 13% special load tariff for low voltage; extraordinary burden levy - medium voltage - 11%; special load tariff: high voltage mines receive 21% and 14%, respectively.

The public authority will likewise forcefully seek after the public LPG advancement strategy to smooth out the area. This decrease is "to give help to the unfortunate whose singular utilization falls in the financed everyday routine line classification yet who experience in a compound house. Lifeline and non-lifeline residential customers will gradually be separated from the current four-tier tariff classification. This is due to Ghana's high electricity prices, which rank among the highest in West Africa.

The Daily Graphic is excited about this move because it will make power more affordable for businesses, as production costs heavily rely on it. Due to the multiplier effect of what businesses use power for, the price of power always favors businesses. Price discrimination favors businesses everywhere, and Cote d'Ivoire and other West African nations are working to lower the cost of electricity for businesses and industry.

In contrast, commercial customers in Ghana pay $0.32 per kilowatt hour for electricity, while residential customers pay 19.28 cents per kilowatt hour. However, the neighboring nation of Cote d'Ivoire charges $0.13 per kilowatt hour for commercial users and $0.9 for domestic users. The value dissimilarity is because of the way that the Francophone country produces less expensive power than Ghana. The Daily Graphic views the lowering of power tariffs as a significant boost for businesses, despite the fact that many political commentators view it as the fulfillment of yet another campaign promise made in 2016.

The fact that the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI) released the Business Barometer (BB) report in February of this year cites the high cost of electricity as a major obstacle to the growth of businesses in the fourth quarter of 2016 as well as a high number of taxes and the delay in paying for projects as supporting our position. The most pressing issue facing businesses today is the high cost of electricity, which affects almost every region.

We would like to warn the government not to renege on this important policy statement that is expected to make our manufacturing sector competitive on a global scale, but to do everything in its power to ensure that it is implemented. We are all in favor of removing the roadblocks that prevent the manufacturing sector from expanding in order to encourage the sector to invest some of its profits in expanding businesses so that it can hire more people and make the sector competitive on a global scale.