By Laudia Anyorkor Nunoo
Tema, Oct. 08, GNA – President John Dramani Mahama has commissioned a newly upgraded production line at the Nestle Ghana Limited factory in Tema, describing the investment as a significant boost to local manufacturing and Ghana’s industrial revival.
The upgraded production line replaces a facility that served the factory for more than 30 years and has increased annual production capacity from about 12,960 tonnes to nearly 30,000 tonnes, representing an increase of more than 60 per cent.
President Mahama said the expansion demonstrated the confidence of established industries in Ghana’s improving investment climate and supported the government’s objective of strengthening local production under its 24-hour economy initiative.
He noted that the expansion would ensure that products such as Ideal Milk continued to be filled, sterilised and packaged on Ghanaian soil by Ghanaian workers.
“This is at the heart of the 24-hour economy initiative,” he emphasised.
The President said Tema was regaining its industrial significance, pointing to the expansion of the Tema Port, efforts to revive the Tema Oil Refinery, plans to restore VALCO and progress within the industrial enclave, saying, “I am pleased to say that Tema is regaining its glory days.”
President Mahama said many industries in the Tema enclave, including Nestle, were expanding production because of improvements in the investment climate.
He cited the increase in foreign direct investment from $624 million in 2024 to $2.62 billion in 2025, a decline in interest rates between nine and 13 per cent and a reduction in inflation.
He said the Ghana Cedi had also regained strength and was performing relatively well.
“I do not recite these figures for their own sake because stability is not a number in the report; it is the difference between a company that tells an expansion and one that decides to go forward with an investment,” he said.
President Mahama described Nestle as a “Ghanaian institution” rather than a guest or stranger in the country, noting that its brands had become part of the lives of generations of Ghanaians.
He recalled fond childhood memories of Ideal Milk, saying the product had been used in tea, Koko, rice water and other meals, while children sometimes sneaked to the refrigerator to drink the milk after their mothers had put it away.
“If you have not been through this, I don’t know if you grew up in Ghana,” he said, as he recounted how children would sometimes press the tin after it had been opened to get the remaining milk.
He said the experience reflected the strong connection between Nestle’s products and Ghanaian households, citing Ideal Milk, Milo, Cerelac, Nescafé and Carnation among brands that had become familiar household products.
President Mahama said the investment being commissioned demonstrated Nestle’s continued commitment to Ghana and its confidence in the country’s future.
The President said Tema remained central to Ghana’s industrial ambitions, recalling that it was the city where the country’s founding President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, established the industrial foundations of the young republic.
“Tema is the city where our founding father, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, planted the industrial ambitions of a young republic, and it still remains the place where that ambition is most visibly at work,” he said.
He said the commissioning of the Nestle production line was another indication of the city’s continuing role in Ghana’s industrial development.
President Mahama said every industrial investment in Tema helped answer the question of whether Ghana could produce what it consumed.
“This morning at the Tema Factory of Nestle Ghana Limited, the answer is an emphatic yes,” he said.
GNA
Edited by Benjamin Mensah
Reporter: Laudia Anyorkor Nunoo
Email address: [email protected]