[ 2014-07-23 ]

Food & beverage companies sack 500 workers
Some companies in the food and beverage sub-sector
are reportedly laying off workers as they battle
skyrocketing operational costs.

Business Day Ghana has learnt that one of the
companies importing food had laid off about 500
workers between May and June this year. Another
company has sent home about thirty expatriate
staff during the period.

Their umbrella body, the National Union of
Teamsters and General Workers (NUTEG) says it has
been duly notified by other companies about their
plans to send home more workers.

NUTEG is attributing the development to high
inflation, the fast depreciating cedi as well as
high taxes and utility tariffs. Over the past six
months inflation has increased from 13.5 to 15
percent with the Cedi also depreciating by about
27 percent.

Desmond Sackey, NUTEG General Secretary told
Business Day that some of the retrenched workers
are not being paid their retrenchment packages due
to the dire financial situations of their
employers. He said his office has been inundated
with calls from affected employees who are
agitating over the matter.

“We are suffering; yesterday my office was
besieged by frustrated workers who are being laid
off. I also had a mail that one other company will
lay off 41 workers by the end of July. So are we
building an economy of unemployed youth? If you
can’t expand the economy to create more jobs,
why can’t you sustain those who are already in
employment? So when they are laid off and they go
home and they can’t make ends meet, they become
social liabilities on this country. Government
must do all it can to stabilize the Cedi, “he
noted.

Mr. Sackey said food prices have soared by 100
percent between January and June this year.

“A bag of rice which was 75 Ghana Cedis in
January is now 150 Cedis. A 3 Kilogram weight of
Chicken which was 40 Ghana Cedis is now 90 Ghana
Cedis, more than 100 percent increase. Fuel prices
have gone up by 23 percent, and cost of
transportation has also gone up. So the additional
cost of transporting the food will be passed on to
consumers. But workers’ salary remains the same.
So the prices will go up but they cannot afford
them”.

Mr. Sackey cautioned government against the
withdrawal of subsidies as proposed by some
analysts and social commentators. The proposal
followed government’s inability to pay subsidies
to oil distributors and the associated fuel
shortages.

He is warning that the total withdrawal of
subsidies will worsen the living standards of
workers, adding that a social democratic
government cannot justify any attempt to withdraw
subsidies.

Source - Business Day

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