African Development Bank Group (AfDB) Ghana’s Ministry of Finance have launched an Institutional Support Project to strengthen domestic revenue mobilisation in the country.
The U.S.$7.4million project, Development Diaries gathered, was launched after the signing of grant and loan agreements and the first disbursement of project funds.
The project is expected to facilitate prudent debt management, deepen financial sector reforms and support capital market development.
Ghana, according to the International Monetary Fund’s recent Debt Sustainability Analysis, has a high risk of debt distress.
‘The project will help the country return to prudent debt levels through improved debt management capacity and a sustainable cash flow to smooth public spending’, a statement on the AfDB website read.
The project, it is understood, aims to complement efforts to strengthen domestic resource mobilisation in the West African country, following the challenges in revenue mobilisation due to supply disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
‘Specifically, the funds will provide technical assistance and capacity building to improve efficiency in non-tax revenue collection and bolster debt and cash management reforms’, the statement added.
At the project launch, Manager at the resource mobilisation and economic relations division of the finance ministry, Emmanuel Fordjour, thanked the multilateral finance institution for supporting the government.
He expressed the Ministry of Finance’s commitment to accelerating the project’s implementation.
Also speaking, the AfDB Country Manager for Ghana, Eyerusalem Fasika, emphasised the importance of the project to Ghana’s medium-term development objectives and the ministry’s 2018–2021 strategic plan.
According to Fasika, the project provides the foundation for additional fiscal space to support investments in infrastructure to bolster industrialisation, job creation and spur private sector activity and regional integration.
For his part, the Director-General of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Daniel Tetteh, commended the bank for supporting Ghana’s transition to risk-based supervision for its capital markets.
Source: AfDB
Photo source: Carsten ten Brink
