Finance Minister, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, has announced that government intends to grow Ghana’s economy by 6.8 percent in 2018.
According to him, the figure represents a 0.5 percent increase, compared to 2017 which was pegged at 6.3 percent.
The minister made the announcement on the floor of Parliament, whilst presenting the government’s budget and policy statement for 2018.
He hinted that government has targeted “an overall GDP growth rate of 6.8 percent, with non-oil GDP growth rate of 5.4 percent.”
“Our prime focus is to ensure that the fiscal deficit, which remains our principal fiscal anchor, continues on a downward trajectory, reaching 4.5 percent of GDP from the projected 2017 end-year estimate of 6.3 percent,” he added.
Inflation
On inflation, Mr Ofori-Atta explained that government was targeting an end-of-year inflation rate of 8.0 percent, lower than the 11.2 percent targeted in 2017.
Currently, inflation rate as at October stood at 11.6 percent, the finance minister announced.
He was however, hopeful the fiscal deficit of the country may stabilise below 5 percent of GDP, as government puts in all the macroeconomic measures to grow the economy.
“Achieving this objective is not only critical, but necessary if we are to maintain the healthy primary balance surplus required to eventually reduce the rate of debt accumulation,” he reiterated.
Source: GhanaWeb
