The management of the Tumu Community Cooperative Union (TCCU) has expressed its readiness to embrace the Warehouse Receipt System Project (WRS). The leadership of the Union observed that the WRS presents real opportunities for the association to enhance the financial status of its members thereby improving their livelihoods.
At a training session organized at Tumu in the Upper West Region by the WRS Project of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank Group, the leadership of the Tumu Community Cooperative Union acknowledged that the WRS interventions will help them to control the default rate of loans granted to members by the Union.
The Board Chairman for the TCCU, Mr. Kodimah Issifu explained that members of the Union would no longer have the opportunity to divert their produce since the commodities would be stored in separate and secured warehouses. “This Warehouse Receipt System brings us an opportunity to expand our membership base and operations whiles helping us to reduce the loan default rate because members can no longer divert their produce”, he emphasized.
Madam Aisha Batong Hor, the General Manager of the TCCU, on her part indicated that there are many opportunities with the WRS intervention that would be used to develop various products to serve the needs and aspirations of the union members. “We have already identified many products and services that could be developed to enhance the agribusinesses of our members as we also grow the Union’s agribusiness portfolio.
The IFC Ghana WRS Project is being implemented in nine regions of the country with financial support from the Switzerland’s State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO). It is a technical assistance and advisory services project aimed at setting up a well-functioning regulated WRS that is expected to facilitate an increased access to credit to farmers and the supply chain, linkage to structured markets and reduce post-harvest storage loses. This intervention focuses on supporting a well-functioning WRS as a necessary pre-condition for the successful operations of the Ghana Commodity Exchange (GCX). The project addresses WRS on a policy and regulatory level, system level, including technical advisory, training, capacity building, and awareness-raising for various stakeholders in the public and private sectors.
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