The Ashanti region covers an area of 24,389 sq.km., which is approximately 10 per cent of the size of Ghana. Kumasi, the regional capital, is the second largest city in Ghana. Ashanti region in 1984 had a total population of 3,612,950 persons which represented 19 per cent of Ghana’s population. The region is rich in natural resources such as timber, minerals, particularly gold, and arable land suitable for the cultivation of most of the important industrial crops grown in Ghana. Ashanti region is the second most industrialized region after the Greater Accra and controls about 25 per cent of Ghana’s manufacturing industries. An analysis of the region’s occupation distribution shows that about 62 pre cent of the employed persons were engaged in agriculture and forestry. Further, 9 per cent of the region’s employed labour was in manufacturing, 1 per in mining and quarrying and 14 per cent in the service industries of trade, catering and hotel. (National Census 2000). Most of the region's inhabitants are Ashanti people (around two-third of total population), one of Ghana's major ethnic groups.