Ghana Cultural Lesson One

In Ghana, your family is not limited to your spouse and kids, but include your brothers or sisters and their children.

It has become a dilemma for doing business in Ghana, should you do American way of offering the health and other benefits to only the employee, and immediate family members, or would you follow the local rule of extending the benefits to both the employee families and his/her brother/sister's children?

In the World Bank's annual report of Doing Business in 2008-2009, Ghana is ranked 92 in ease of doing business, after China, which is ranked 89. Ghana is ranked 7 among sub-Sahara countries, after Mauritius, South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Rwanda and Zambia.

Could the cultural factor have played a role in forming barriers of doing business in Ghana? As a matter of fact, most Chinese had hard time picturing the local Ghanaian enjoy a full public holidays and five day work week, since Chinese workers working on constructions or retails in Ghana seldom take any days off.

Today in New York City, Ghanaian president John E. Mills invited American business to invest in Ghana. At a Bank of America Merrill Luncheon, he told business and finance executives that Ghana won't disappoint U.S. investors.

Giant U.S. business players such as copper and gold mining firm Freeport has agreed to invest up to $1 billion in Ghana. The new discovery of oil field off the Gulf of Guinea has also fired up some interests from world energy players.

In the Wold Bank report, Ghana ranked poorly (153) in obtaining a construction permit and starting a business. The ease of doing business will be judged on the further improvement in these sectors.