Ghana’s Debt Stands At GH¢142bn; Reaches Dreaded 70% To GDP

New figures released by the Bank of Ghana (BoG) after its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting show that Ghana’s public debt reached 142.5 billion cedis as at December 2017, representing 70 percent of GDP.

This means that the debt stock has hit the dreaded 70 percent of GDP, a point the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has constantly cautioned against.

Comparing the 2017 figure to the same period in 2016, the total debt stock was at 122.6 billion cedis but was 73.3 percent of the GDP.

The figures show that in the last quarter of 2017, the debt stock increased from 138.9 billion cedis in September to 142.5 billion in December.

The domestic component of debt as at December 2017 stood at 66.7 billion cedis, while the foreign debt stock was at 17.2 billion cedis.

Export Earnings

In the first two months of the year, export earnings by February 2018, reached 2.8 billion dollars.

Gold raked in a little over 1 billion dollars, while cocoa fetched cocoa 650 million dollars. Earnings from oil export also reached 664 million dollars.

On the import side, Ghana spent 2.2 billion on imports.

Banking Sector 

In the banking sector, Total Advances of banks saw a drop this year from 38.5 billion cedis in January to 35.8 billion cedis in February. Also, Banks Total Asset stood at 95.1 billion cedis, same as January this year.

Source: Citibusinessnews