New figures released by the Bank of Ghana (BoG) after its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting show that Ghana’s public debt reached 142.5 billion cedis as at December 2017, representing 69.8 percent of GDP.

This is a reduction from the 73.3 percent recorded in December 2016.

The total debt stock in 2016 was at 122.6 billion cedis.

This means that the debt stock has almost hit the dreaded 70 percent of GDP, a point the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has constantly cautioned against.

The data shows that in September 2017, Ghana’s debt stood at 138.9 billion cedis representing 68.1%; the figure dropped to 137.6 billion cedis in October representing 67.4%.

But in November 2017, it went up to 139 billion cedis representing 68.1 percent.

The domestic component of debt as at December 2017 stood at 66.7 billion cedis, while the foreign debt stock was at 75.8 billion cedis.

Export Earnings

In the first two months of the year, export earnings by February 2018, reached 2.8 billion dollars.

Gold raked in a little over 1 billion dollars, while cocoa fetched cocoa 650 million dollars. Earnings from oil export also reached 664 million dollars.

On the import side, Ghana spent 2.2 billion on imports.

Banking Sector

In the banking sector, Total Advances of banks saw a drop this year from 38.5 billion cedis in January to 35.8 billion cedis in February. Also, Banks Total Asset stood at 95.1 billion cedis, same as January this year.

Source: Citibusinessnews.com