[ 2017-05-09 ]

Dr Lord Mensah

6.3% GDP target overambitious – Dr. Lord Mensah
Some economists are predicting that Ghana’s
economy will be 5 percent by the end of this
year.

This is lower compared to government’s 6.3
percent and the World Bank’s 7 percent
projections.

Although Ghana ended 2016 with a growth of 3.5
percent which was also lower than the previous
year’s 3.9 percent, government’s economic team
maintains that policies to boost industrial growth
and the coming on board of new oil fields such as
TEN and Sankofa, should propel growth and help
meet the target.

But Dr. Lord Mensah tells Citi Business News
current developments make the projections
over-ambitious.

“I’d rather project an end of year growth of
5%. The 7% is quite overambitious; the reason is
that the speed at which we grow the economy is not
the same as the speed at which economic
fundamentals dip,” Dr. Mensah said.

“It is relatively easier for an economy’s
growth to fall off target by some distractions.
But then if you want to grow an economy, then it
borders largely on strategic allocations of the
resources available to you and that is quite
difficult. So if you are projecting, you don’t
need to be that overambitious,” the Economist
added.

The Country Director of the World Bank, Henry
Kerali in a recent interview told Citi Business
News that developments on the global commodity
markets predict a bright outlook for Ghana’s
economic growth.

He also opined that the interventions outlined by
the NPP government plus expected oil output should
culminate in economic growth target of 7 percent.

Meanwhile the Member of Parliament for New Juaben
South, Dr. Mark Assibey Yeboah tells Citi Business
News any possible distortions to the target should
be triggered by fiscal imbalances.

“Because new oil fields are coming on board, you
know the TEN oilfields production started last
quarter and we expect Sankofa, Gye Nyame too to
come on board so the growth targets of 6.3%.”

“Where I have some concerns might be with the
deficit targets. The revenue for the first quarter
of this year has not been that good so we want to
see more efforts on the revenue side and if that
one comes in then we are good,”Dr. Assibey
Yeboah stated.

Source - citibsinessnews.com

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