Accra, Dec. 18, – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has highlighted three major bottlenecks affecting implementation of Ghana’s US$3 billion Extended Credit Facility (ECF) programme, despite assessing overall performance as “broadly satisfactory”.
The concerns relate to challenges with the operationalisation of the Integrated Tax Administration System (ITAS), which has been rescheduled into three phases due to implementation difficulties, and delays in reforms to earmarked funds after authorities chose an alternative reform approach.
The Fund also cited further delays linked to the validation and updating of the beneficiary registry for the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) programme, as well as the reform of the asset declaration regime.
These issues were disclosed in an email response to the Ghana News Agency on Wednesday evening, following the IMF Executive Board’s approval of Ghana’s fifth review under the ECF arrangement.
The three-year, US$3 billion programme was approved in May 2023 to help restore macroeconomic stability and debt sustainability, strengthen resilience, and lay the groundwork for robust and inclusive growth. With the completion of the fifth review on Wednesday, December 17, Ghana will receive an immediate disbursement of about US$385 million, bringing total disbursements to roughly US$2.8 billion.
Commenting on programme implementation, the IMF spokesperson indicated that, out of eleven structural benchmarks under the current review, four were met, two were implemented with delays, one was completed as a prior action, and four were missed.
Nonetheless, all end-June 2025 performance criteria were achieved, with progress recorded in key reform areas including the audit of 2024 payables, taxpayer data cleanup, and submission of the 2026 Budget consistent with programme objectives.
The Fund attributed the implementation challenges to complex legal, technical, and institutional constraints and underscored the need to sustain reforms to preserve macroeconomic stability, safeguard debt sustainability, and address long-standing structural weaknesses.
In a statement issued after the Board meeting, IMF Deputy Managing Director Bo Li reaffirmed that Ghanaian authorities demonstrated strong programme ownership through decisive corrective measures after 2024 policy slippages. He said these actions, together with structural reforms, had supported faster-than-expected growth, returned inflation to the Bank of Ghana’s target band, and bolstered reserve accumulation.
He emphasised that maintaining fiscal discipline would require stronger revenue administration, tighter public financial management, and enhanced oversight of State-Owned Enterprises, which continue to present significant fiscal risks. He further stressed the importance of improving transparency and public disclosures, particularly regarding SOEs in the gold, cocoa, and energy sectors.
According to him, ambitious structural reforms to strengthen the investment climate, improve governance, and enhance transparency remain central to unlocking private sector growth and generating sustainable employment.
Ghana’s ECF arrangement is anchored on the government’s Post COVID-19 Programme for Economic Growth (PC-PEG), introduced amid severe external shocks that intensified pre-existing fiscal and debt pressures. The crisis led to a loss of access to international capital markets, limited domestic financing options, and reliance on monetary financing, with the IMF-supported programme—scheduled to end in 2026—intended to provide a pathway to recovery.
The Fund noted in its fifth review report that reforms are yielding results after last year’s slippages, with economic growth through September 2025 surpassing expectations, driven primarily by strong performance in the services and agriculture sectors.
GHBUSS
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