The development of Ghana’s Financial markets is deemed necessary for the economy to be able to meet its growth prospects.
Dr. William Godfred Cantah, an Economist with the Department of Economics, University of Cape Coast made these comments while making a presentation at the Economic Governance Platform (EGP) under the theme “Assessment of the Ghanaian Economy 2012 – 2020”. The Platform’s overall focus is ensuring good governance, fiscal transparency, sound public financial management, and citizen engagement in the development process.
Assessing Ghana’s economy for the past eight years and offering proffered solutions for its growth, Dr. Cantah asserted that the financial sector is an area that can support businesses to grow in order to stimulate the economy.
Additionally, he said the financial market plays an important role in developing industries in the economy and as such its development is key.
“So, if your financial market is not developing then you will have challenges developing new industries in your economy. You will always have to depend on foreign investment”.
Dr. William Godfred Cantah
Touching on the recent financial sector reforms, Dr. Cantah opined that though it had its repercussions on Ghana’s economy, it was necessary, adding that the Central Bank should be keen in its supervision.
“The impact of the banking sector clean-up comes in several folds. It also affected the confidence of many people in the banking industry. But it is good that government took up the cost of depositor’s funds.
“My only challenge was with the approach the government took to tackle the issue. We had no choice than to tackle the issue. If we had not tackled the issue, the economy would have been worse off today.
“The Bank of Ghana should be more intrusive in its supervision. They should be looking for problems to solve before they escalate so that we don’t experience what we experienced in the last three years. We must see the problems before they come off”.
Dr. William Godfred Cantah
Dr. Cantah further asserted that, Pension funds can generate huge capital for the development of the economy and resolve other related pressing national challenges. However, many Ghanaian workers are not enrolled on such Pension Schemes. Also, the insurance sector has been neglected hampering the growth of the Ghanaian economy.
The Economist further suggested that the agricultural sector remains a major driver of the economy and as such the leadership and policymakers should create a derivative related instrument and market for the industry, especially for farmers.
The Chairman for the discussion, Vitus Azeem, former Executive Director of Ghana Integrity Initiative also mentioned a few areas including unemployment and poverty which policymakers should tackle to improve living conditions for the Ghanaian populace.
“Employment response to growth has not been impressive. Associated with this weakness is an increasing inequality even-though poverty has been reduced over the last 30-years.
“Today, Ghana is confronted with numerous economic challenges that require urgent policy attention… slow growth, high inflation, unstable exchange rates, and the rising debt levels have resulted in worsening unemployment, poor living conditions, and the high poverty rate among Ghana’s population,” he disclosed.
The Programme Coordinator for EGP, Felix Ankrah, sharing his thoughts emphasized the effect of the coronavirus pandemic on major economies around the globe of which Ghana is not an exception.
This pandemic and its associated difficulties are a major factor for the in-depth assessment of Ghana’s economy by EGP, to identify the challenges encountered over the period under review and to provide recommendations for a resilient economy, Mr. Ankrah noted.
