Nano Foods Limited, formerly ASTEK Refresh Pineapple Juice Company has been revitalized. At the inauguration of the food processing company situated in Nsawam, a call was made on Ghanaians to explore all opportunities in the traditional sector of the economy to accelerate the national economic transformational agenda.

The project, which is under the One District, One Factory (1D1F) programme, brings to 77 the number of factories in operation since the inception of the initiative in 2017.

Nano Foods Limited, which came out of the defunct ASTEK Refresh Pineapple Juice Company in the 1980s and 1990s, had only been producing ASTEK Nsu sachet water since it was revived in 2014.

It presently provides about 100 direct jobs for Ghanaians, with hundreds of indirect jobs in the Eastern and the Central regions.

In December 2018, the Ghana Exim Bank approved a capital expenditure loan and a working capital facility of $1,067,600 for the company, which went on to acquire and install a complete pineapple processing and canning line, together with a modern and efficient quality control laboratory.

Economic Transformation through Agriculture and Exports

This comes as part of the government’s efforts to transform the economy through agriculture. Nano Foods Limited would be processing pineapples from farms located mainly in the Eastern and the Central regions. Its products would be exported to the United States, Western European and Middle East markets to meet the constant demand primarily from Spain, Hungary and Cyprus.

The export-driven aspect of the project would help consolidate the successes achieved so far in improving the country’s trade balance and its foreign exchange reserves.

“For the first time in over two decades, the trade balance, which is the difference between what the country exports and what it imports, recorded a surplus for four consecutive years from 2017 to 2020. Ghana’s Gross International Reserves had also increased from $6.1 billion (3.5 months of imports) in 2016 to $8.6 billion in 2020 (4.1 months of imports),” the Vice-President stated at the inauguration.

Industrial transformation

The revamping of the defunct ASTEK Refresh Company into Nano Foods Limited is designed to add value to the natural resources at the grass-roots level to provide decent job opportunities for the youth and women. It is also geared towards reducing the importation of goods through import substitution in order to provide opportunities for export.

Future Plans of Nano Foods Limited

The company is expected to re-introduce the ASTEK Refresh juice drinks as part of its second phase of development. This would require a further investment of $2 million. With the further investment, it would be able to achieve a turnover of over $10 million with a labour force of about 300 working for the company in the next two to three years.

The Managing Director of Nano Foods Limited, Mr. Albert Anti Owusu, added that the company also had plans to increase its production line by introducing tiger nuts, cocoa beans, snails and garden during the second phase for export

source: graphic.com.gh