Ghana and Japan have reaffirmed their commitment to strengthen economic ties and accelerate major infrastructure projects after a high-level meeting between President John Mahama and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba on the sidelines of TICAD 9 in Yokohama.
President Mahama stressed Ghana’s strategic role in Japan’s cocoa supply, pointing out that the country provides about 70 percent of Japan’s imports. He urged Japanese companies to scale up investment in Ghana’s cocoa value chain, including a planned public–private partnership with the Cocoa Processing Company to modernize its plant and boost value addition.
The President also pointed to upcoming milestones in bilateral relations, including the centenary of Dr. Hideyo Noguchi’s arrival in Ghana and the 50th anniversary of the Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers (JOCV) in 2027. These anniversaries, he noted, would further strengthen people-to-people and development cooperation—topics he has previously discussed with Japan’s Ambassador to Ghana, Hiroshi Yoshimoto.
