By Francis Ntow, GNA
Accra, Oct 30, GNA – Dr Cassiel Ato Baah Forson, the Minister of Finance, will present the 2027 Budget Statement and Economic Policy to Parliament on November 12, the Deputy Finance Minister, Thomas Nyarko Ampem, announced on Thursday.
Mr Ampem said the budget will focus on translating recent macroeconomic stabilisation gains into productive investments, decent jobs, higher incomes and improved living standards for Ghanaians, through the Government’s US$10 billion New Economy agenda.
He said this at the launch of the Ghana in Numbers 2025 Report by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) in Accra, noting that the stability achieved formed the foundation, with productivity as the engine and jobs and prosperity as the destination.
“It is against this background that the minister will present the 2027 budget statement and economic policy of government to Parliament on the 12 of November. That budget will advance the next phase of our economic agenda moving Ghana from stabilisation to the new economy,” he said.
The Deputy Minister said the new economy would be productive, competitive, diversified, technology driven and inclusive, one that would add value to the Nation’s resources, support Ghanaian enterprises, drive innovation and create opportunities for young people.
On the report, he maintained that achieving the country’s economic transformation ambition required credible and timely statistics, noting that the ministry relied on such data for strategic budget allocations, policy formulation and investment decisions.
“Credible numbers do not tell us what we want to hear, but they tell us what we need to know,” he said, describing the Ghana in Numbers 2025 and its digital dashboard as a critical tool to bring evidence closer to the decisions that shaped national development.
He urged parliamentarians, ministries, departments and agencies to increasingly use official statistics to set priorities, allocate resources and measure results, adding that MPs could use the report to enrich debate on the floor of Parliament.
Mr Ampem emphasised the need to safeguard the independence and credibility of official statistics, pledging government’s support and provision of resources for GSS to deliver the evidence needed for national development.
During a panel discussion on the sidelines of the report launch, Professor Godfred Alufar Bokpin, an Economist, urged the Government to set deliberate employment targets in the budget and made resources available to achieve the targets.
He also called for investment into agriculture, agribusiness and agro-processing, rural-urban road infrastructure development, which were the country’s best bet for decent jobs creation, instead of “pacifying party foot soldiers with policy slogans.”
“The growth that we have celebrated have come from less desirable areas. We need to direct investment into sectors that when you get a business, you also get employment,” the Professor of Finance at the University of Ghana Business School (UGBS) said.
He cautioned that overemphasising the development and growth of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), instead of supporting the transition of specific businesses into large companies in the long-term could trap many in the unemployment circle.
“Countries that have developed didn’t develop solely on the back of SMEs. It will be a trap. We must have a national strategy to move certain businesses from micro to small – small to medium and from medium to large,” he recommended.
Speaking on the relevance of statistics, Johnson Pandit Asiama, the Governor of the Bank of Ghana, said reliable data was crucial for monetary policy, financial sector regulation, and Ghana’s development agenda.
“Let us see Ghana in Numbers not merely as a statistical publication, but as a national resource for understanding our circumstances, evaluating our progress, and making better decisions about our collective future,” Dr Asiama noted.
Dr Alhassan Iddrisu, the Government Statistician, noted that Ghana’s economy reached GHS1.4 trillion with a six per cent growth in 2025, adding that the economic expansion had not translated into decent jobs.
He stated that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth stood at six per cent in 2025, inflation fell from 23.8 per cent in December 2024 to 5.4 per cent in December 2025, while Gross International Reserves reached US$13.8 billion, representing 5.7 months of imports cover.
Emphasising that Ghana’s growth had been without gainful employment, Dr Iddrisu urged that policy targeted growth job-rich sectors, in addition to providing affordable private credit to transition the 92 per cent informal businesses into the formal sector.
GNA
Edited by Agnes Boye-Doe
Reporter: Francis Ntow
Email: [email protected]