Ghana’s economy expands 6.7% in first quarter

Ghana’s economy grew 6.7 per cent year-on-year in the first three months of 2019 compared to 5.4 per cent in the same period last year, the Ghana Statistical Service said on Wednesday.

The quarter-on-quarter seasonally adjusted growth rate was 1.6 percent compared to 1.7 per cent for the last three months of 2018, Professor Samuel Kobina Annim, Government Statistician said at a News briefing.

Non-oil growth for the first quarter stood at 6.0 per cent year-on-year compared to 4.2 last year.

For the first quarter of 2019, the Services sector expanded 7.2 per cent year-on-year with the information and communication sub-sector recording the highest year-on-year quarterly GDP growth rate of 37.0 per cent.

On the other hand, the Finance and Insurance sub-sector recorded the lowest growth of 2.1 per cent, Prof. Annim said.

The year-on-year quarterly GDP growth rate for Agriculture is 2.2 per cent for the first quarter of 2019.

The livestock sub-sector recorded the highest year-on-year growth rate of 5.5 per cent, while the Forestry and logging sub-sector recorded the lowest, with a contraction of 5.8 per cent.

The year-on-year quarterly GDP growth rate for the Industry sector is 8.4 per cent for the first quarter of 2019.

The Mining and Quarrying sub-sector recorded the highest year-on-year quarterly GDP growth rate of 20.9 per cent for the period, while the construction sub-sector recorded the lowest, with a contraction of 8.7 per cent.

Meanwhile, the Producer Price Inflation fell slightly to 6.7 percent in May from 7.1 per cent in April.

The Mining and Quarrying sub-sector recorded the highest year-on-year producer price inflation rate of 15.1 per cent, followed by the manufacturing sub-sector with 6.2 per cent.

The utilities sub-sector recorded the lowest year-on-year producer inflation of 1.1 per cent.