Total revenue, grants fall marginally
Government’s total revenue and grants for the first half of the year fell below expected target by 1.9 per cent.
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In the period under review, government managed to rake in GH¢74.7 billion against a projected target of GH¢76.1 billion.
The Minister of Finance, Dr Mohammed Amin Adam, in his first major assignment since assuming office early this year, announced when he laid the 2024 Mid-Year Fiscal
Review yesterday.
“Despite the shortfalls, the outturn shows a nominal year-on-year growth of 24.6 per cent and constitutes 42.3 per cent of the budget's total revenue for the year,” he explained.
Dr Amin Adam attributed the revenue performance to what he described as the strong performance in Non-oil Tax Revenue and Non-oil Non-Tax Revenue which partly offset the shortfalls in oil receipts for the period.
“Mr Speaker, total expenditures (commitment) amounted to GH¢95.9 billion, below the budget target of GH¢104.8 billion,” he added.
Public debt developments
With respect to Public Debt Developments in 2023 and Half-Year (H1) of 2024, the Finance Minister said as at end-December 2023, the provisional central government and guaranteed debt in nominal terms stood at GH¢608.4,4 billion.
This was made up of GH¢351.1billion and GH¢257.2 billion for external and domestic debt respectively.
He said the provisional total central government debt as at end-June 2024 stood at GH¢742.0 billion, equivalent to 70.6 per cent of gross Domestic Product (GDP).
This indicates an increase of 22.0 per cent due to the effect of the cedi depreciation and disbursements from creditors.
The stock consists of external debt of GH¢452.0 billion and domestic debt of GH¢290.0 billion, representing 60.9 per cent and 39.1 per cent of the total debt stock, respectively.
Dr Amin Adam said as a percentage of GDP, external and domestic debt represented 43.0 per cent and 27.6 per cent, respectively.
Other indicators
Regarding other macroeconomic indicators, the Finance Minister celebrated the declining rate of inflation, saying: “Inflation is declining. End-June inflation rate of 22.8 per cent, a reduction of 31 percentage points from the December 2022, confirms that the target of 15 per cent by end 2024 is possible.”
He also pointed to the exchange rate which he said had largely stabilised, compared to December, 2022, despite the recent pressures.
The 18.6 per cent depreciation rate to the US Dollar as of June 2024, represents an improvement over the 22.0 per cent recorded for the same period last year.
On Gross International Reserves, the Finance Minister reported that the reserves reached 3.1 months of import cover as at end June 2024 against 2.5 months of imports cover in the same period last year.
“Mr Speaker, it is evident that we are on the right trajectory. The economy is rebounding stronger than anticipated. The choices we have made and the policies we are implementing are yielding results.
We have reversed the negative trends, all the indicators are looking better. I want to assure you that we will stay on this path and continue to make the right choices. Our economic recovery is fast and strong,” he said.
He said over the last six months, the government had sought to bring some urgency and speed to the implementation of key government programmes and also swiftly provided the necessary support for growth-enhancing initiatives.