B5 Plus: CEO Mukesh Thakwani Talks Competitive Advantages and Cheap Imports Coming to Ghana

Mukesh Thakwani, Founder and CEO of B5 Plus Ltd, the leading manufacturer of steel products in Ghana and West Africa, talks competitive advantages in the pre-engineered building segment and discusses the problem of cheap imports coming to Ghana.

“B5 Plus has put up a state of the art industry for PEB (pre-engineered building). It is not only the biggest in Ghana, but this is the biggest industry in the whole of West Africa where we are able to produce all types of steel and fabricate any type of product, from residential buildings, to industrial warehouses, tankers, trailers or any type of housing. We have just built a hostel and we recently built a mall. We are able to build anything related to that, and it goes across any type of industries. We have put up state of the art machinery. We have training centers, and we are putting up our expertise. So we are looking at producing competitive goods at your doorstep with the record timeline that we are able to build with. We only require the government policy to stop cheap imports which are coming from different parts of the world, and stop giving any type of exemptions on pre-engineering building. That will solve the problem. Before, we were running a 24 hour shift, but today, we are only running a 12 hour shift, and that means we are only producing 25% of our capacity which is very sad. The Ghana government is giving exemptions and allowing the importations to happen, and we are taking orders from Senegal, Gambia, Guinea, Mali, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso and Togo. We are exporting everywhere. In Ghana, we have been giving exemptions and less duty, and allowing the importation of finished products to come in which should stop. So we plead with the government to look into this and see how we can try to stop this cheap importation, while at the same time, creating value and saving our US dollars, as that is the most important thing about foreign currencies”, says Mukesh Thakwani.

FAIR USE POLICY
This material (including media content) may not be published, broadcasted, rewritten, or redistributed. However, linking directly to the page (including the source, i.e. Marcopolis.net) is permitted and encouraged.