Ghana is one of Africa’s rising stars, the country doesn’t fall far behind the big
economic players on the continent like Nigeria, South Africa, and Morocco and it is the only
African country whose entertainment industry is giving Nigeria a run for its money. Ghana
is a beautiful West African state situated in the center of the Gold Coast of Africa,
with a population of over 31 million people, and has a 535-km-long shoreline that includes
breathtaking lagoons and lush mangrove forests. The country’s tropical climate varies from
a Sudanian-type climate in the north with a short rainy season to the high
rainfall regime of the forested Guinean and Guinea-congolian Regions in the southwest.
Ghana has become one of the richest countries in Africa because of its numerous economic activities
and its ability to attract foreign investors to come and invest heavily in the country.
Ghana has thrived especially in sectors of Agriculture, Mines, and Tourism. In this video,
we are going to take a deep dive into the different reasons why Ghana is so rich.
But before we begin, we would like to take out the time to thank those who liked our previous video.
We got up to a hundred likes and it helped us reach more people.
In this video, we hope to get a hundred and two.
please if you love this video take out a second and hit the like button. Thank you.
Let’s Begin With Agriculture. By far this is the biggest contributor to Ghana’s
economy. Agriculture alone contributes to 54% of Ghana’s GDP and accounts for over 40% of exports
earnings of the country and at the same time provides over 90% of the country’s food needs.
Ghana exports agricultural products like cashew nuts, peanuts, and cocoa seeds. Compared to Cocoa,
all the exports amount to nothing. Ghana prides itself to be among the highest producer
and exporters of cocoa on the African continent, second only to Ivory Coast.
The export of cocoa has traditionally dominated the economy of Ghana, and today it is one of the
world’s largest exporters of cocoa, which employs approximately 800,000 Ghanaians.
Cocoa production and exportation generate over 2 billion dollars in annual foreign exchange,
despite the abundance of cocoa in Ghana, only 20% is unfortunately processed in the country the
rest is processed in countries that import cocoa from Ghana like Malaysia, Switzerland, and the
Netherlands. But lately, the President of Ghana stopped the exportation of cocoa to Switzerland.
This is in order to encourage local processing and production of cocoa products like chocolates.
Agriculture remains a major economic sector,
providing income for nearly half of Ghanaians. The country is endowed with rich natural resources.
But That is not all. Ghana is richly blessed with
an abundance of natural resources such as timber, gold, diamonds, bauxite, manganese, and oil. These
all contribute to making Ghana among the wealthier nations in West Africa. As a matter of fact,
Ghana is the highest producer of Gold in the whole of Africa. The minerals mined in
Ghana account for 37% of the country’s total exports, with gold comprising 90% of total
mineral exports. Miningglobal dot com estimates Ghana’s gold reserves to be 1000 metric tonnes.
Ghana has become known for attracting so many foreign investors. well, they deserve it. A
favorable business environment is one of the key factors that drive foreign investors to a country.
Government policies, security, infrastructural development
are some of the things investors put into consideration, and Ghana has proven
to the world that they are more serious and committed to easing the way business is done
in their country. all these charms their way into the hearts of foreign investors.
Another booming industry in Ghana that has greatly been contributing to its GDP
is the tourism Sector. People travel far and wide to come and enjoy this beautiful country.
And Normally when people visit, they spend. they live in very expensive hotels, they pay for
transport, they consume the local products. All these activities feed the flame of Ghana’s economy
making the country richer and richer. As a matter of fact, Ghana is among the friendliest countries
in Africa. In 2020, the travel and tourism sector in Ghana contributed nearly 1.9 billion U.S.
dollars to the country's Gross Domestic Product. This decreased compared to the 3.7 billion U.S.
dollars registered in the preceding year. But as the saying goes.
Not all that glitters is gold. Ghana just like most other African countries has its shortcomings.
How did Ghana get this rich? It can’t just be luck.
to know this we’d have to look back at history. While its economy is one of the most successful
in the region, it remains heavily dependent on international finance. Ghana, like most
West African countries, has daunting environmental challenges since its economic development depends
directly on natural resources. Large tracts of dense forest have been cleared to support
increasing cocoa production. Mining is causing localized land degradation and water pollution.
A quarter of its people are concentrated along the narrow coastal zone. The area now known as Ghana
has been involved in a handful of conflicts with many African countries, and like many
African countries, it was colonized by European nations over the last 2000 years. In 19 57,
Ghana became the first self-governing country on the African continent, under president Kwame
Nkrumah. Today, Ghana’s president is Nana Akufo Addo and the country continues to be a strong
force in the economic development of Africa. Ghana is also an affordable location to visit
since a dollar will get you 5.78 cedis and the cost of living is one-fifth of what it is in
North America. however, for Ghanaians who live below the poverty line, living costs can be quite
dicey as their income is so low. The population of Ghana lives in a cosmopolitan metropolis,
and the government recognizes a host of indigenous languages as national languages. Two of the most
widespread of these are the Twi language of the southern and central regions and the southern
and Dagbani languages of the Dagomba people more commonly spoken by people in areas to the north.
Today most Ghanaians identify as Christian. However, the native religion of the influential
Ashanti empire was a form of this faith tradition that is still active today and is
a big part of Ghanaian culture and they’re combined with Christian traditions too.
The Ashanti empire was influential in shaping the culture of modern Ghana and fashion
is no exception. Kente cloth the fabric worn by Ashanti is still a point of national pride.
Now let’s dive into the main issue here how exactly Ghana fostered economic growth
in such a quick spell of time Economists still have their heads spinning. Two years ago Ghana
was referred to as the world’s fastest-growing economy with terms such as skyrocketing being
used to describe its growth. This change has occurred in only 3 decades and for any country,
with a history of ups and downs, this is an exceptional achievement. This was largely made
possible due to good governance and sustainable development seems to have done the trick.
The government has always set its focus on Ghana’s economy ever since it gained independence. By the
late 1900s, the success of Ghana’s cocoa crops brought over from equatorial guinea in 18 78
seemed to be securing the country’s status as an up-and-coming economy to be reckoned with. But,
all too soon the drop in the price of cocoa meant that the booming economy started to slow down.
Although Ghana was also a big exporter of gold and had wealth of natural resources,
the country’s heavy reliance on cocoa exports saw the dip in Ghana’s economy taking a toll
on all aspects of life for Ghanaians. The country faced significant challenges and ghana’s economy
was far from being the fastest growing economy in Africa. Good governance began with government
officials upping their commitment to getting better at governance. This meant taking note
of what the country really needed and making decisions informed by Ghana’s past, present,
and future. And this good governance brought about something remarkable in the 19 90s.
Ghana’s economy was being strengthened and not by some new commodity the country could sell.
The strength came from a more structured and equitable system of governance
the new government transparent democracy. The government looked to strengthen society
and industry through economic reform. By the mid-19 90s, Ghana was once again experiencing
rapid economic growth. Thanks to good governance put forward in policies and plans looking to
improve the quality of life for Ghanaians. These gains were boosted in 2007 with the
discovery of offshore oil and ghana’s economy was showing signs of bursting at the seams.
Ghana has also consistently ranked in the top three countries in Africa for freedom of speech
and press freedom. In the early years of independence, the country approached reform with
the Economic recovery program (ERP). This program had its focus on urban issues and sidelined the
challenges faced by rural communities. In this way, the ERP overlooked the connections between
rural and urban communities and how one community could benefit from improvements in the other.
Since the start of Ghana’s independence, the wealth of rural communities lagged well behind
that of city dwellers. Bridging this gap in equality meant bringing better access to jobs
and better pay for rural people. And by 19 97 the Ghanaian government had come up with a plan.
Good governance had brought with it some great opportunities to turn paper policies
into practical progress in the form of the village infrastructure project (VIP).
Looking to intensity efforts to reduce poverty and increase the quality of life across the country,
The Ghanaian government launched the VIP.
There was a keen call for community participation even during the planning phases of the project.
The VIP had four main focus areas all aligned to community concerns. Ghana ranks well above
others for the amount of rainfall it receives each year. But this abundance of water was
not well distributed geographically and this added to the gap in equality across the country
through the VIP, the importance of managing the country’s water well was acknowledged.
The government invested in and developed infrastructure for water catchments
as well as water conservation activities. Before the implementation of the VIP, only 8000 of the
20,000 kilometers of road feeding into rural areas were maintained by the government. Ghana’s history
shows its economy was dependent on agricultural produce and in 19 97 nothing much had changed.
Moving produce and livestock from fields to farms and from farms to markets became
a central focus for the Ghanaian government. This was the key to growing Ghana’s economy,
and if the roads are ready, the supply better be steady. But the improvement of roads wouldn’t just
mean transporting. It would mean bumping up production to new heights. This posed
a problem since there weren’t enough quality post-harvest facilities buildings where produce
is stored before being transported to markets. In Ghana to store an upscaled amount of produce
before the VIP the spoilage of harvested crops accounted for a staggering 100% of the cost
of harvesting. The VIP also shed light on great things to come in Ghana. Things like institutional
strengthening through community empowerment. While institutional strengthening may sound like
a top management task in Ghana it was really all about giving power back to the people. It started
with the redistribution of administrative responsibilities to 110 district assemblies.
Shifting power from national to district level. The DAs were assigned the highest authority at
the local level and were responsible for providing basic education, public health,
environmental protection, and sanitization. To do this, the constitution dedicated 10% of
the gross domestic product of the activities of DAs. This was known as the District Assemblies
Common Fund (DACF). And each DA was appointed an agricultural coordinator from the community
to push post-harvest infrastructure and other agricultural activities.
This allowed rural communities to settle into managing projects on the ground
that would improve their own livelihoods. With the VIP and other government initiatives
well underway the world could see how good governance got Ghana steering towards
sustainable development. The gains made in Ghana can bring hope to many a challenging situation.
But keeping up progress while protecting national resources can be a tricky balancing act.
2 years ago, the World Resources Institute (WRI) showed that Ghana was one of the top
ten countries increasingly losing swathes of its rainforest. Interestingly, the rainforests are
being cleared to grow cocoa crops. Which has again become a major commodity for export in Ghana.
And even though Ghana’s economy has boomed over the past few years to dip again last year which
it did. This thorn in the side of Ghana’s success seems to come from a struggle with sustainability.
Yes, Ghana has built the idea of sustainability in its economic reform programs,
but promises on paper don’t always filter down to the ground except where there is good governance.
In the Overseas Development Institute’s (ODIs) review on Ghana’s agricultural growth
making farming environmentally sustainable. Conserving resources of soil,
forest, and biodiversity were described as a key challenge. Working in its favor,
Ghana made moves toward the UN SOGs before these goals were even completed in 2015
showing Ghana’s history of committing to sustainability and it stayed true to that history,
having rolled out tons of programs in every sector to address its issues with sustainability.
Emission Capacity Building(ECB) project and multiple projects aimed at educating communities
on sustainable forestry and water use. This goes to show that Ghana has the good
governance and sustainable development stride that it needs to get its economy back on track
as long as it sticks to sustainable progress. Thanks for watching this video and if you enjoyed
it please leave a like and also don’t forget to subscribe and become part of our community of
touristers and hit that notification bell so as not to miss out on any of our upcoming videos.