September 25, 2019

Assessing the management of Ghana Petroleum Funds [Policy Brief No. 7]

Ghana’s Petroleum Revenue Management Act (PRMA) requires a portion of petroleum revenues to be set aside in the Ghana Petroleum Funds (GPFs) for saving and investment. This policy brief presents the findings of a study which assessed transparency and efficiency in the management of the GPFs. To read the full report, click here.
September 25, 2019

Assessing the management of Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) revenue [Policy Brief No. 8]

Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), the national oil company, receives close to one-third of the total petroleum revenues of Ghana, placing it at the core of the country’s aspirations towards effective management of its hydrocarbon resources. This policy brief presents the findings of a study which assessed transparency and efficiency in the management of the petroleum revenue allocated to GNPC. Click here to read the full report.
November 26, 2019

Policy Brief 9: Pass the Tax Exemptions Bill

In contrast to the rapid growth of expenditure, tax revenue in Ghana has remained very low as a share of GDP over the years due to the country’s tax-expenditure regime, including a wide range of exemptions and various forms of preferential tax treatment, concessions and low compliance. The continuous rise of tax exemptions impacts negatively on how much the government mobilizes as revenue to the state. Click here to read the full policy brief.
February 10, 2021

Exchange Rate Instability In Ghana: The Causes And Remedies [Occasional Paper No. 20]

Exchange Rate Instability In Ghana: The Causes And Remedies [Occasional Paper No. 20]
February 10, 2021

Ghana’s Large Public Sector Compensation Bill- Agitations, Policies, Implications, Causes and Recommendations [Occasional Paper No. 22]

The government of Ghana has long complained about the growth of the public sector compensation bill. It has therefore adopted different policy measures over the years to address this phenomenon. However, these policies have not had a lasting impact on the compensation bill growth. Data therefore reveal that the size of the country’s compensation bill as a ratio of total revenue/expenditure has reached alarming proportions in recent years, despite having seen strong declines in the 1980s. We find that the compensation bill is currently posing serious fiscal and macroeconomic difficulties for the country. Although a few studies have been carried […]
August 23, 2021

The Role of the Extractive Sector in Ghana’s Comparatively Low Public Sector Revenue Mobilization [Occasional Paper No. 24]

The government of Ghana has implemented extensive tax and non-tax policy and administration reforms over the years. Starting from 1983, these reforms have largely been carried out under the auspices of the IMF and the World Bank. However, using a sample of 35 countries in the developing world, we find in this paper that, relative to GDP, Ghana’s total public sector revenue has performed very poorly, compared with those of its peers, confirming findings of other studies. The government of Ghana has often blamed the country’s poor revenue performance on the difficulty in taxing the large informal sector, the generous […]