Total Debt Stock Of The Country Stands At GH¢291,614 Million- Caretaker Finance Minister
The Minister of state responsible for finance Hon.Osei Kyei Mensah Bonsu presenting the budget statement indicated that, the provisional debt stock of the country as at December 2020 stood at
nominal figure of GH¢291,614 million, representing 76.1 percent of GDP compared to
GH¢217,991 million, equivalent to 62.4 percent of GDP in 2019.
He stressed that, the total debt stock mix was made up of a provisional figure of
GH¢141,780.60 million for external debt and GH¢149,833.89 million for domestic debt,
accounting for approximately 48.6 percent and 51.4 percent of the total public debt
stock, respectively. As a percentage of GDP, external and domestic debt represented
36.99 percent and 39.09 percent, respectively.
He added, the total public debt has increased from GH¢122 billion (56.9% of
GDP) in 2016 to GH¢ 291.6 billion (76.1% of GDP) at the end of December 2020.
Included in the debt stock and the debt/GDP ratio at the end of 2020 are the following
non-recurrent burdens that we had to deal with as matter of urgency:
• Fiscal Impact of COVID-19 – GH¢ 19.7 billion;
• Cost of Financial Sector Clean up – GH¢ 21 billion;
• Cost of Excess Capacity Charges paid to IPPs – GH¢ 12 billion;
• The impact of the reduction in growth from an average of 7% (2017-2019) to
0.9% in 2020.
“If these expenditures are excluded and the drop in GDP growth in 2020
primarily attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic is taken into account, the total stock
of debt for 2020 would have been approximately GH¢ 238.9 billion implying a debt to
GDP ratio of 58.7%” he elaborated
According to the Majority Leader, the following information is useful:
• Between 2004 and 2008, Ghana’s debt stock increased by 30%.
• Between 2008 and 2012, the debt stock increased by 269%.
• Between 2012 and 2016, the increase in the debt stock was 243%.
• Between 2016 and 2020, the increase in Ghana’s debt stock was 137% (This
includes the cost of the banking sector clean-up, excess capacity charges and
the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic).
The acting Finance Minister stated that, despite the impact of the pandemic, the rate of growth of the
public debt has been lower under our government than under the previous
government.
“The rate of debt growth was lower despite massive investments in our
flagship programmes such as free SHS, Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ), NABCO, One
District One Factory (1D1F), One Constituency One Ambulance, One Village One Dam
(1V1D), restoration of teacher and nursing training allowances amongst others while
maintaining relative macroeconomic and exchange rate stability.” He said