GHANA – GIHOC Distilleries Company Limited, the Ghanaian state-owned manufacturer of distilled and alcoholic beverage brands, has outlined plans to set up five fruit-based alcohol plants known as Standardisation Depots under the One District-One Factory (1D1F) initiative.

The factories are to be located in five selected agricultural communities in the country namely, Techiman, Goaso, Nsawam, Bibiani and Agogo reports Ghana Web.

According to the Managing Director of GIHOC Distilleries, Mr Maxwell Kofi Jumah, highlighted that the factories will transform discarded or rotten fruits into alcoholic drinks and wine.

 “It is the various value chain activities of a factory that will create real sustainable jobs for the youth. We need the youth to go and gather them, wash them and standardise it (take it to the milling machine) and bring it to us.”

“We are the off takers, we will buy everything that you produce because the alcohol that you get from these fruits are the best and GIHOC, we are committed to do that and we are lucky we have the support of 1D1F”, he noted.

According to Mr Jumah, Ghana is endowed with fruits because of the favourable climate, stressing that the country is one of the few places in the world where fruits are in abundance.

“In alcohol business – there are three types; we have the molasses made from sugarcane, grain alcohol made from grains and sometimes from cassava – this is the most popular alcohol used all over the world.”

“Almost 70 per cent of the fruits go to waste given that the country has them in abundance. It is in this that GIHOC intends to leverage,” he explained.

The National Coordinator of the 1D1F Secretariat, Gifty Ohene-Konadu, welcomed GIHOC’s decision to set up the fruit plants indicating that the impact in the localities will be enormous and that the government is ready to continue to partner with companies and institutions to grow.

Liked this article? Subscribe to Food Business Africa News, our regular email newsletters with the latest news insights from Africa and the World’s food and agro industry. SUBSCRIBE HERE