Business News of Friday, 25 October 2024

Source: ghanaiantimes.com.gh

IMF projects 3% end of year growth rate for Ghana

IMF Managing Director, Kristalina Georgieva IMF Managing Director, Kristalina Georgieva

The Interna­tional Monetary Fund forecasts that Ghana will conclude the year 2024 with a growth rate of 3 percent, as stated in the World Economic Outlook Report published in Washington D.C., on Tuesday.

Published during the meet­ings of the IMF and World Bank, it aligns with the government’s forecast of a 3.1 per cent GDP growth rate as stated in the 2024 Budget.

However, some IMF offi­cials have indicated that these growth figures may be revised before the year’s end, as the World Economic Outlook did not fully account for recent economic developments.

A senior IMF official stated that, “We are optimistic that Ghana will perform better in terms of growth by the end of the year than we previously estimated.”

The World Bank, in its Africa Pulse Report released earlier this month, projected that Ghana’s growth rate could reach 4 per cent by the end of 2024.

This is attributed to a surge in economic activity during the last two quarters of the year.

Initially, the World Bank had forecasted a 3.1 percent growth rate for Ghana in 2024, but recent developments have led the Bank to revise its outlook.

The IMF, in the same report, projected an end-of-year inflation rate of 19.5 percent for Ghana. This is significantly higher than the Bank of Ghana’s target range of 13-17 percent.

However, the IMF also predicts that inflation could drop to 11.5 percent by the end of 2025, indicating progress towards achieving single-digit inflation.

The World Bank’s Africa Pulse Report similarly expects inflation to reach 11.5 percent by the end of 2025.

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