The Film Directors Guild of Ghana (FDGG), in its bid to drive the growth of the film and tourism industry in the country is collaborating with top notch movie producers from Hollywood.
According to a statement from the body, it has concluded plans to work with Boris Kudjoe, the Austrian born, German and Ghanaian descend, Hollywood Actor with other top players from America’s movie industry.
Speaking at a meeting in Ghana, held at Kempiski Hotel in Accra, Boris Cecil Tay-Natey Kudjoe, expressed his interest in bringing top notch Hollywood producers to film their movies in Ghana who are ready to visit the West African country.
He noted that their coming will be determined by the kind of incentives that the government of Ghana is ready to put in place to attract them.
He mentioned that the government of Ghana will have to see the relationship between the development of the Ghana Film Industry and tourism, noting that the Film Industry basically promotes the tourism industry. He stated that it is the Film Industry that attracts foreigners to the country who come as tourists.
Boris Kudjoe cited that in the United States of America, the Film Industry produces the highest GDP as compared to the Tourism Industry; noting that the Film Industry makes direct investment in the economy than any other economic sector in the world.
He said: “With film, we invest direct to the economy and never take back the money we invest. We hire people and pay them cash. We rent accommodation and hire equipment and pay cash into the country’s economy. There is no way to get that money back; the money goes into the system. So the only way to get that money back is for the local government to pass a law of a certain percentage of tax revert for the Film Producers and the Investors.”
He further requested that the government of Ghana gives a 30% tax revert for the Hollywood film producers to attract them to come and shoot their films in Ghana.
In his response. the National President of Film Directors Guild of Ghana, Mr. Richard Yaw Boateng, said he and his executives in the Film Directors Guild of Ghana have been working on the same initiative since 2015. But then government of Ghana at the time didn’t see the importance of that.
Mr. Boateng revealed that he led a delegation to call on the current President last year 17th October, 2017, to discuss the state of the Ghana Film Industry with the President Akufo-Addo at the Jubilee House. “The President was overwhelmed to hear the situation at hand and the state of the Ghana Film Industry. The President expressed his interest in the development of the Ghana Film Industry and charged me to work with the Minister for Tourism, Arts and Culture told make sure something good is done about it. Since we don’t have any direct link to Hollywood and rather to Bollywood, we have channelled our attention to India. So we went to India in 2015 to negotiate and sign an MOU with the authorities of the Film Producers but our government then did nothing to support the initiative, so we couldn’t progress with it,” said Mr. Boateng.
Boateng said he will be leading a delegation to India to renegotiate the MOU signed in India in 2015. He revealed that the delegation led by him will be leaving for India on the 3rd of June, noting that the Ghana High Commissioner in New Delhi, India, H.E Mike Oquaye Jnr is facilitating the meetings with the Bollywood authorities. And that the Minister for Tourism, Arts and Culture would be funding the trip.
