Every part of Ghana to enjoy electricity by 2020 - Veep

Government says it is on course to connect electricity to every part of the country by 2020 as part of the National Energy Strategy.

Speaking at the opening of the 2016 Annual Meeting of the Association of Power utilities Africa (APUA) in Accra , Vice President Paa Kwesi Amissah Arthur said various interventions by government including the National Electrification Scheme will help in attaining the objective.

The Ghana Grid Company (GRIDco) says the the national access rate to electricity by the end of 2015 increased to 80.5%.

"In line with our National Energy Strategy, we have put in place the mechanisms to ensure that by 2020 there will be universal access to electricity. Interventions including the national electrification scheme (NES) , self help electrification project (SHEP), and the ghana energy development and access project (GEDAP) will assistin attaining the target" , the vice president reiterated .

From data on Sub Saharan Africa, Ghana is behind Gabon and South Africa in terms of access to electricity excluding small island states.

Despite the efforts to expand access to electricity across the country, Ghana has been struggling to solve a three year power crisis that has impacted the economy negatively and led to the collapse of several other businesses.

Vice President Amixsah Arthur conceded that ,"our power sector has had major disruptions because of inadequate power supply that required that consumers exhibited a certain amount of restraint and understanding. Both producers and consumers suffrage during the period ".

Also speaking at the 2016 APUA Annual Meeting the Chief Executive of the Volta River authority Kirk Koffi, said Ghana was on course to address the current power challenges .

"Ghana in the last three years has had its fair share of problems . To avert a future recurrence , we are pursing various rehabilitation and expansion programmes on the generation , transmission and distribution infrastructure as each segment has responsibility to add value to the industry" , he stated

The 50th Annual Meeting of Apua is on the theme, Energy development through customer management , revenue collection and energy efficiency .