She was addressing the opening session of the 28th annual delegates congress of the Ghana National Union of Polytechnic Students (GNUPS) at Takoradi.

The congress was on the theme "Realizing Academic Progression for Polytechnics - A link to Ghana's Industry and Technological Advancement."

Madam Horner-Sam said the polytechnics are to produce middle-level manpower for industry adding, "much as it is desirable and even necessary to have personnel at the top, middle-level personnel are also needed."

She said it is necessary that polytechnics focus on their curricula based on science and technology to promote accelerated industrialization.

Mr Paul Effah, Executive Secretary of the National Council for Tertiary Education, said polytechnics, being technological-based institutions, had a major role to play in developing technical and technological skills.

Mr Effah said the polytechnics also had a role in promoting research into ways to improve the efficiency of indigenous industries to enable them to perform at optimum capacity.

He said polytechnics must provide local and regional development otherwise they would lack local support and wither away.

Mr Effah said as institutions set up by an Act of Parliament, the polytechnics must meet national needs and aspirations, which included helping to reposition Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in the country.

Professor James Adu Opare, Dean of the Faculty of Education, University of Cape Coast, said unless the Polytechnics receive the quantum of funding to modernize their equipment, there is the danger of producing graduates without levels of proficiency desired by industry.

He said as a result of poor funding and poor infrastructural development, Polytechnics are behind in technological and economic development.

Professor Opare said the proliferation of Polytechnics without corresponding resource support had rendered them too handicapped to offer any meaningful post Higher National Diploma (HND) programmes.