Covid-19: The economy will slide downwards for about 2 to 3 years before picking up – Finance Minister

Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta says Ghana‘s economy would suffer a downward slide for about two to three years, as the government tries to rebuild the economy.

Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express, the Finance Minister said “I had indicated what I termed trapezoid recovery which means sort of the plummeting impact of the 6.8% to the 0.9% and the slow slide potentially downwards for about two, three years before we pick up again.”

His comments follow the novel coronavirus’ dire impact on the Ghanaian economy as many businesses have had to shut down in order to mitigate the spread of the virus.

Earlier in April, the Finance Minister had bemoaned the country losing more than one billion dollars of revenue as a result of the government’s attempt to deal with the pandemic.

The Central bank had also expressed fears the Coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) will collapse growth in the economy to 2.5 per cent in 2020.

However, the Minister says the government’s strong efforts to revive the economy might pay off eventually in the coming years should bolder steps be taken.

“I’m a lot more confident of the resilience we have shown and I think if we intervene very strongly and put classical economics aside, and say we’re going to intervene boldly and make sure that the supply response comes, get people working, get people independent, I think we’ll come out much faster,” he told George Wiafe on July 16.

myjoyonline.com