Rev. Dr Samuel Worlanyo Mensah, an Economist and Executive Director of Centre for Greater Impact, Africa, has noted that Ghana needs more specialized banks to support the various sectors of the economy for development.
Speaking at a seminar organized for state and non-state actors to address national issues, the Executive Director stated that for the country to develop in its current state, there is the need to have banks for each sector of the economy. He therefore, emphasized the need to have a national development plan.
“At the stage we find ourselves now as a country, we need to have banks that are purposely for industrialization, agriculture, pharmaceutical, building the technical development, building local technology, and others in a national development plan”.
Rev. Dr Mensah
Rev. Dr Mensah, thus, attributed the recent economic crisis the country is experiencing to the lack of a strong national development plan for the country. In his view, having a national development plan by which every government that comes to power compulsorily abides by, will help the country progress exponentially.
The Executive Director of Centre for Greater Impact Africa charged the government to support industrialization and productivity by creating an enabling environment for the local people to be well established in order to compete in the global market.
According to the Economist, most of the local entrepreneurs depend on the local banks for capital and other financial assistance; hence the need for the specialized banks to support the various sectors.
Rev. Dr Mensah suggested that the government must have a definite plan to nurture entrepreneurs in a way that in the next ten to 15 years, “it would raise solid entrepreneurs who could support the economy.”
Financial Sector Clean-up, Commendable
Rev. Dr Mensah explained that the banking and financial sector cleaning exercise carried out by Bank of Ghana was laudable at the time it was undertaken. Nonetheless, he indicated that it was hampered by the pandemic. He stated that, “but unfortunately COVID-19 pandemic has revealed that the decision was not economically motivated.”
“At the end of the day, most of the local banks have collapsed because they were not able to raise the minimum capital requirements, while others had also engaged in other cooperate social responsibility.”
Rev. Dr Mensah
He however, admitted that the government could have handled the situation differently. “So, the government could have created a module to shape their operations and assist them to be able to grow to the international standard.”
The Economist further noted that most of the banks in the country are not ready to help local entrepreneurs to stand on their feet. According to him, most of the small businesses have been left stranded because financial institutions that supported them were dissolved.
It can be recalled that the Minister of Trade, Alan Kyeremanteng has indicated his intention of the ‘Ghana Traders Bank’ to be established with the sole mandate of providing competitively cheaper loans for Ghanaian traders. If the plans of establishing this bank materialises, it will serve majority of the informal sector of the economy and this will spur development, as suggested by the Economist.
