By Morkporkpor Anku
Accra, Nov. 15, GNA – Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, the Minister for Finance, says the country’s growth strategy has supported the implementation of interventions that increase the capacity to produce, deepen value-chains, facilitate, and modernise storage facilities and increase the shelf-life of products.
The improvements are expected to help support exports, build forex exchange buffers and reduce inflation.
The Minister said this when he presented the 2024 Budget statement to Parliament on the theme: “Nkunim” in Accra on Wednesday.
He said Government’s 5-year Growth Strategy, which was approved by Cabinet in August 2023, was to stimulate and sustain economic growth even as the country restored macroeconomic stability under the IMF-backed Post COVID-19 Program for Economic Growth (PC-PEG).
The first phase, which is a 14-month programme, essentially focuses on scaling up prioritised existing programmes and attracting Private Sector Investments to deliver rapid results without significant demands on budgetary resources.
He said the Growth Strategy prioritised key sectors of the economy, including agriculture, agri-business and aquaculture, trade, industry and export promotion, tourism, as well as digitisation and technology.
The Minister said the recently launched ‘Ghana Mutual Prosperity Dialogue’ would support that path of growth.
“A permanent Steering and Technical Committee, co-led by the Ministries of Finance as well as Trade and Industry and the private sector and supported by our Development Partners, is being set up to drive this collaboration for growth,” he added.
He said last year, he discussed the enormous impact of the food imports bill on exchange rate volatility and inflation, and it was made clear how unsustainable the imports were and the need to change course.
GNA