Takoradi is Ghana's oil-and-port capital of the Western Region — the twin city of Sekondi-Takoradi, and the country's second city of commerce after Accra. **The twin city.** Sekondi and Takoradi are administratively one — Sekondi-Takoradi — with Sekondi as the older colonial town and Takoradi as the modern harbour city. Together they form the capital of the Western Region, one of Ghana's 16 regions, and the largest urban centre in the west of the country. The Akan name *Takoradi* is often linked to *Ntakoradi*, a reference to the shallow lagoon waters that once marked the shoreline before the harbour works. **The port.** Takoradi Harbour was opened in 1928 under Governor Sir Gordon Guggisberg — the same visionary who gave Ghana Korle Bu Hospital and Achimota School. For decades it was Ghana's only deep-water seaport, handling cocoa, timber, manganese and bauxite. When Tema opened in 1962, Takoradi settled into its role as the western gateway: cocoa, timber, manganese from Nsuta, and later the offshore oil industry. The Takoradi Port Expansion Project (with the new breakwater, dry bulk terminal and oil services terminal) has modernised it substantially in recent years, and it now serves the Jubilee, TEN and Sankofa oil and gas fields offshore. **Oil and gas.** Since commercial oil was struck in 2007 and Jubilee came onstream in 2010, Takoradi has become Ghana's oil-services hub — supply bases, fabrication yards, logistics companies, and a steady stream of expatriate and Ghanaian engineers. The Western Regional Coordinating Council and the Petroleum Commission's regional presence sit in this orbit. **Economy and people.** Beyond the port: fishing (the Takoradi and Sekondi harbours land significant catches), timber and plywood, cocoa warehousing, salt, and a growing retail and hospitality sector. The city is home to Takoradi Technical University (formerly Takoradi Polytechnic), and to a large, cosmopolitan population — Fante, Nzema, Ahanta, Ewe, Ga and northern communities all well represented. The Ahanta are the indigenous people of the immediate Takoradi area; Nzema country lies to the west toward Axim and the Ivory Coast border. **Culture and life.** The city is Fante-Akan in cultural flavour — Fante language dominates, with Ahanta and Nzema spoken alongside. The annual Kundum Festival is the great Ahanta-Nzema harvest celebration, rotating between towns of the Ahanta and Nzema areas; Sekondi-Takoradi also hosts the Western Regional edition of many national events. Football runs deep — Sekondi Eleven Wise and Sekondi Hasaacas are historic Ghanaian clubs, and the Essipong (Sekondi) Sports Stadium, built for CAN 2008, remains a landmark. **Getting there.** Takoradi is about 220 km west of Accra on the N1 coastal highway — roughly 3½ to 4 hours by road. Takoradi Airport (TKD) handles domestic flights from Accra, and the railway line from Takoradi to Kumasi, though long in decline, is being rehabilitated in phases. A fitting proverb for a port city: *"Ɔbaa a ɔnnim kwan dze, ɔbisa"* — the traveller who does not know the road asks. Takoradi has been asking, and answering, the world's trade questions since 1928.