The 4th edition of the Volta Trade and Investment Fair, 2019 kick-off last Friday at the Ho Sports Stadium with dozens of exhibitors from and outside the region in attendance.
The event under the auspices of the Volta Regional Coordinating Council (VRCC) and its partners was aimed promoting the region’s investment potentials to the rest world through culture and trade exhibition.
However, few days into the 10-days event, the fair is yet to receive the needed patronage from the public, as attendance on the first three days was quite poor.
A tour of the event grounds by Voltaonlinegh.com revealed very little business activities were ongoing with most exhibitors sitting idle behind their stands.
Some exhibitors who interacted with this news portal confirmed that turnout so far has not been encouraging, a situation they attributed to low publicity on the part of organizers.
“Business is here is bad” a trader in African wears told Voltaonlinegh.com from her makeshift bed under the exhibition tent.
“I have been monitoring the radio stations in town and not much is being said about the fair,” another exhibitor in pharmaceuticals said, adding that, “It seems the organizers are only interested in the money but careless about publicizing the event to attract patrons so that we can also get the needed leverage. We paid over GHc800.00 for a stand and we’re only here idling.”
That notwithstanding, the exhibitors are still hopeful the situation would change for the better probably after the official opening of the fair on Tuesday.
They however appealed to the organizers to make available a standby generator to ensure uninterrupted power supply throughout the fair.
Meanwhile, Mr. McRay Sogah, a member of the publicity and entertainment sub-committee for the fair has assured exhibitors of necessary arrangements to get more patrons to the event before it wraps up on Sunday, December 2, 2019.
“We’ve been talking with some of the radio stations to come and broadcast their programmes live from the grounds so they can direct traffic to the fair and very soon we should see a great change in the attendance,” he told Voltaonlinegh.com.
The fair since the last one in 2011 has on display, indigenous products and services in the food and beverage, pharmaceutical and herbal, textile and garment, tourism and hospitality industries, among others.
A huge performance stage has also been mounted at the venue for indigenous artistes and cultural troupes to entertain patrons during the fair.
Source: www.voltaonlinegh.com
