2024-01-19 19:16:00
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced on Friday the immediate payment of $600 million to the Ghanaian government, as part of its aid program, following announcing an agreement to restructure the country’s external debt.
This new disbursement, validated by the Board of Directors of the Fund, brings to 1.2 billion dollars the aid already paid to the West African country, out of the three billion dollars in 36 months provided for by the program.
“Today’s agreement is an important step,” stressed Ghanaian Finance Minister Kenneth Ofori-Atta at a press conference, “it is the unmistakable demonstration that the program is progressing steadily and that our trajectory of reforms is stable”.
The head of the IMF mission in the country, Stéphane Roudet, judged for his part that “the government is putting in place a reform program necessary to restore macroeconomic stability and debt sustainability.”
The announcement comes as Ghana last week finalized an agreement with its main external creditors for a debt restructuring, a necessary step to enable the payment of aid under the IMF program.
A step considered “positive and important towards establishing the sustainability of Ghana’s long-term debt”, the country’s Ministry of Finance reacted at the time.
“We thank France and China for their role” in debt restructuring, Mr. Ofori-Atta said on Friday.
The Ghanaian government hopes that the IMF board’s approval will prompt the World Bank board to consider $300 million in financing for the country.
The IMF also finalized its Article IV (its annual review of a country’s national economy) for Ghana. After a slowdown in Ghanaian growth, which should stand at 2.3% in 2023, the Fund estimates that it should start to rise once more and anticipates 2.8% in 2024 then 4.4% in 2025.
The recovery of the economy, IMF assistance and debt restructuring should enable Ghana to reduce its debt ratio from 93.3% of GDP in 2022 to 86.1% this year and 72% of here in 2028.
A major producer of cocoa and gold, Ghana also has gas and oil reserves, but its debt load has exploded in recent years, as in other sub-Saharan African countries, notably under the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukrainian conflict.
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