RE: Ghana Does Not Have an Economy

Dr. Amoah couldn't have been more apt when he argued in his piece on ghanaweb.com posted on February 4, 2014 that Ghana has no economy. I wholly agree with every fabric of his argument including the fact that the three key sectors of the economy namely 1)agriculture 2) industry 3) finance should be delineated and nurtured. There is a wisdom in David Ricardo's quintessential comparative advantage theory that crudely postulates that a country should engage in economic activities where it has comparative advantage in cost of production, specialization and economy of scale and import only the products it has comparative disadvantage. Can we argue that this is what is happening in Ghana? The answer is sadly no. A brief statistics of the economy of Ghana may suffice here; according the Heritage Foundation: agriculture accounts for 50 percent of employment and 39 percent of exports; obtaining necessary permits to start up a business takes over 200 days; unemployment is 11.0 percent; inflation is 9.2 percent. A brief analysis of Ghana's balance of trade will present a better perspective of the direction our beloved country has been heading over the decades. Again, to put it crudely, the balance of trade is simply the country's export minus its import, if the result is positive, it registers a trade surplus, on the other hand, if the result is negative, it registers deficit trade. In 2012, Ghana recorded a trade deficit of US$4.2 billion notwithstanding the fact that crude oil export brought in US$3 billion additional revenue. In the nutshell, what Ghana needs is to develop a niche just as every business entity needs a market niche in order to create a pathway to long term sustainability. We need hybrid crop of leadership who are ready to think outside-the-box and treat the economy at the very minimum like a pseudo corporate entity that needs to be aware of its assets and liabilities. Whatever the pathway we choose as a nation to move forward, agricultural industrialization is the key ingredient. I will leave you with the wisdom that: you are either at the dinner table or on the dinner menu, the choice is up in the air. Visit my blog to have a further discussion on this issue.