For a long time, the standard risk register was a coloured grid. Red meant dangerous, amber meant worrying, green meant carry on. Plenty of organisations still run on it. But across Ghana and the wider continent, more of them are now asking for something sharper: actual figures.

In a comparative assessment of risk management qualifications built around quantitative methods and decision analytics, ChatGPT, the AI assistant made by OpenAI, ranked the Certified in Quantitative Risk Management (CQRM) first. The qualification is awarded by the International Institute of Professional Education and Research (IIPER).

An AI ranking is no regulator’s verdict and should not be read as one. Still, it matches what many professionals already see at work. Employers want to know more than what could go wrong. They want to know how likely it is, what it might cost, and which option gives the best return for the risk involved.

Why the numbers matter now

Ghana’s financial sector is a good example. The Bank of Ghana has said it will bring in new directives on stress testing, recovery planning and risk management, along with a revised risk-based supervisory framework that looks ahead and aims to prevent problems rather than react to them. Speaking at the Ghana Association of Banks’ annual meeting last month, the Governor said the central bank had strengthened its stress-testing framework and was discussing with banks the results of tests run under “severe but plausible” scenarios. The Bank has also published directives on credit risk management and liquidity coverage. And in August, an IMF paper looked at how Ghana’s banks and the central bank would cope with severe, lasting gold price shocks, a risk that sits close to the Ghanaian economy.

Each of these exercises rests on much the same set of tools: simulation, forecasting, optimisation and scenario analysis. Those are the tools the CQRM programme teaches.

What “quantitative” means in practice

It is less forbidding than it sounds. Picture a road, a power plant or a new bank branch with a budget of GH¢100 million. A traditional estimate gives a single number and hopes for the best. Monte Carlo simulation, the main technique in the CQRM curriculum, instead runs the project thousands of times on a computer, varying costs, delays, prices and exchange rates within realistic limits. What comes out is a range. The project might have a 60 per cent chance of finishing within budget, and the analysis shows what is driving the other 40. (Illustrative example.)

The programme also covers forecasting, portfolio optimisation, decision analysis and real options valuation, which puts a price on being able to wait, expand or walk away from a project.

“The question is no longer whether quantitative skills will matter,” says Adam Braimah Jehuri, a risk management consultant who leads OSL Analytic Academy, an IIPER partner. “It is whether Africa’s professionals will lead the shift or watch others do it.”

A Ghanaian head start

Face-to-face CQRM training has run in Ghana since 2019, pausing only during the COVID-19 pandemic. Ghana now has more CQRM Fellows than any other African country, and the numbers elsewhere on the continent are growing steadily. The annual Ghana programme takes place each August and is open to nationals of any African country. OSL Risk Management and IIPER want to bring a globally accredited qualification closer to African practitioners, so that they need not travel abroad to earn it.

CQRM is not only an African story. The UK’s Institute of Risk Management lists it among its own training courses, and the programme is led by Prof. Dr Johnathan Mun, an author and practitioner in risk analytics and real options.

Not only for risk managers

A common misunderstanding is that this is work for the risk department alone. It is not. Bankers use it for credit and market risk, stress testing, and capital and liquidity planning. Accountants and auditors use it for forecasting and for valuing things under uncertainty. Insurers apply it to pricing, reserving, and portfolio risk. In supply chain and procurement, it helps with demand forecasts, supplier risk, and inventory costs. Energy, mining and construction firms use it on cost and schedule risk for large projects, and consultants, public bodies and universities use it to build business cases that stand up to questioning.

Taking the next step

Professionals who want to join the next programme in Ghana, or start on the online route, can find the brochure and registration details at oslriskmanagement.com. Organisations that want to build quantitative skills across their teams can ask about group and in-house options.

Enquiries: Adam Braimah Jehuri

OSL Analytic Academy | IIPER Partner

Email: [email protected]

Phone / WhatsApp: [0202001040]

Web: www.oslriskmanagement.com

I have taken a particular interest in the leadership of Ghana’s Chief Justice, His Lordship Justice Paul Kwadwo Baffoe-Bonnie. This interest has been heightened by recent criticisms which, in my view, make it necessary to examine his tenure not through political lenses, personalities or conjecture, but against the actual decisions and reforms emerging from the Judiciary under his leadership.

It may still be early days, but the evidence so far presents an interesting picture: a Chief Justice seeking to restore confidence in the Judiciary, protect its institutional independence, make justice delivery more efficient and accessible, and yet dissociate himself and his outfit from the old trajectory of public fear of the leadership of the judiciary through a socialization approach.

From the Era of “Unanimous FC”
Not too long ago, the expression “Unanimous FC” entered Ghana’s political and legal vocabulary as a derisive reference to perceptions surrounding a succession of unanimous Supreme Court decisions. The expression became sufficiently established that it even entered Ghanaian legal scholarship, where it was explained as reflecting perceptions among some opposition sympathisers that certain Supreme Court decisions favoured the then-governing New Patriotic Party (UGSLJ, 2023).

Whether those perceptions were justified in every instance is another matter. What cannot be denied is that concerns about public confidence in the Judiciary became part of the national conversation.

Indeed, then National Security Minister, Hon. Albert Kan-Dapaah, publicly warned about the national-security implications of perceptions of biased justice (Myjoyonline, Ghana News Agency etc., 2022). His concern was essentially that where judicial interpretation was persistently perceived and seen as favouring government, confidence in the Judiciary could be undermined.

This historical context matters when assessing Justice Baffoe-Bonnie.
The true test of an independent Judiciary is not whether its decisions please the government or opposition. It is whether the law can operate against the political expectations of either side.

On that score, some developments under Chief Justice Baffoe-Bonnie deserve serious attention.

Kpandai MP, Jean Mensa and Her Deputies: A Significant Test
When it became apparent that the Member of Parliament for Kpandai, Hon. Matthew Yandam, could lose his seat in court, potentially relieving the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) and disappointing the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), the Chief Justice faced a politically sensitive matter. Yet, rather than letting political considerations, emotions, or the circumstances surrounding his own appointment influence the process, he turned to the law, constitutional principles, and the dictates of justice. He applied the law as he found it, irrespective of which political party stood to benefit or suffer from the outcome.

The petition was filed at the High Court outside the constitutionally prescribed 21-day period following the gazetting of the election results. Consequently, the Supreme Court essentially quashed the High Court’s orders on the basis that the court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the petition under the circumstances.
Furthermore, the Chief Justice did not sit as part of the coram that determined the certiorari application.

Consider the petitions seeking the removal of Electoral Commission Chairperson Madam Jean Adukwei Mensa and her deputies, Dr. Bossman Eric Asare and Mr. Samuel Tettey.
Seven petitions seeking their removal were referred by President John Dramani Mahama to the Chief Justice in accordance with the constitutional process. After examining them, Justice Baffoe-Bonnie determined that no prima facie case had been established to warrant further investigation. The removal process therefore went no further.

Pause and consider the political significance and this is the person some Ghanaians want us to believe has bruised the independence of the judiciary? Come on!
These were officials appointed during the previous NPP administration, many of whom had, over the years, come under considerable criticism from sections of the NDC and those who were open-minded in their thoughts.

What should, however, be evident to these critics is the fact that the NDC, while in opposition, repeatedly vowed to remove the Electoral Commission Chairperson and her deputies once it assumed office.

They (the critics) must therefore explain to Ghanaians who, in the circumstances, is allegedly compromised. Because, on the face of these facts, it certainly cannot be Justice Paul Kwadwo Baffoe-Bonnie. Despite the clear biases of the aforementioned Nana Addo appointees, an NDC administration, including a Chief Justice appointed by President Mahama, examined petitions against them and concluded that the constitutional threshold for proceeding against them had not been met.

That is precisely why judicial independence must be assessed by conduct rather than political association.
If Justice Baffoe-Bonnie were simply an appendage of the Executive, as some of his critics seek to portray him, this outcome becomes difficult to reconcile with that narrative.

Kissi Agyebeng and the Office of the Special Prosecutor
The same principle arose in relation to Special Prosecutor Kissi Agyebeng Esq. Three petitions seeking his removal were also referred to the Chief Justice. Again, Justice Baffoe-Bonnie found that they failed to establish a prima facie case warranting further investigation.

Whatever anybody’s political opinion of the Special Prosecutor, the institutional principle is more important.

A constitutional democracy becomes stronger when officeholders are protected not because they are politically useful to somebody, but because the legal threshold required for their removal has not been satisfied.

Interestingly, even some figures associated with the governing NDC publicly indicated that, although disappointed by the decision concerning the Electoral Commission leadership, they accepted the Chief Justice’s determination.

That is how institutions mature.

Beyond Judgments: Reforming Justice Delivery
Paul Baffoe Bonnie is fiercely liberated in his convictions and this is reflected in both his public speeches and his judgments. In 2005, when the NPP government sought to frustrate a civil servant by transferring him from the Ghana Immigration Service to an uncertain organisation, Baffoe Bonnie ruled that the action of the then President amounted to constructive dismissal. He ordered the reinstatement of the officer and ordered the payment of his salary arrears. President Kufour recognized this trait of speaking to power in him and nominated him for promotion to the Supreme Court. The NDC was not pleased and opposed his nomination. Yet when, in 2013, the NPP felt he was one of their own, he again voted according to his conscience and solely on the evidence to keep the NDC in power.

In Sept 2025, when he was only acting as the Chief Justice, he publicly chastised the Mahama government with his famous speech on galamsey at the bar conference in Wa.
But Justice Baffoe-Bonnie’s emerging legacy cannot even be measured only by politically sensitive decisions or his public utterances because he is a human being and not the law itself.

His reform programme may ultimately prove even more consequential.

Under his leadership, the Judiciary has moved towards morning and afternoon court sessions to reduce congestion and case backlogs. His administration has also pursued expanded Alternative Dispute Resolution, specialised courts, accelerated E-Justice, reforms to the Rules of Court and dedicated judicial mechanisms for areas including environmental and illegal-mining cases.

The Judiciary has further introduced a Specialised High Court Division aimed at improving efficiency through judicial specialisation rather than requiring individual judges to handle an unnecessarily broad range of subject matters.

These may not generate dramatic political headlines, but this is where the everyday Ghanaian experiences the justice system.
A litigant waiting a year for a case to be heard is interested in speed. A business trapped in commercial litigation wants efficiency and certainty. A citizen living outside Accra wants accessibility. And an ordinary Ghanaian appearing before a court wants to believe that justice does not depend upon political connections, wealth or status.
That is why Justice Baffoe-Bonnie’s own insistence that justice must become faster, clearer and more accessible deserves attention. He has acknowledged that delays, cost and distance continue to weaken access to justice and public confidence in the courts.

Justice Baffoe-Bonnie has rather brought a refreshing and impeccable sense of relief, openness and renewed confidence to Ghana’s judicial system. For far too long, the concentration of power in the hands of a few created an atmosphere in which some members of both the Bar and the Bench felt constrained, intimidated and unable to express themselves freely. Today, his leadership offers a different narrative, one that seeks to bring the judiciary closer to the people, not as an intimidating institution of fault-finders, but as a friend, a partner in justice and a pillar of hope for the ordinary Ghanaian. His willingness to attend funerals, weddings and other social gatherings, including the recent funeral in Techiman, demonstrates a Chief Justice who understands that judges are not detached figures seated on elevated benches, but human beings who belong to the very communities they serve. More importantly, he speaks his mind, stands by his convictions and engages issues with a measure of independence that deserves to be judged on its merits. So, one is compelled to ask: How does a Chief Justice who is making deliberate efforts to humanise the judiciary, restore confidence in the institution and bring the Bench and the Bar closer to the people suddenly become a “puppet of the Executive” in the eyes of some Ghanaians? Is it now wrong for a Chief Justice to be accessible, sociable, outspoken and willing to engage the public beyond the courtroom? Surely, the independence of the judiciary must be assessed by its decisions, constitutional fidelity and institutional conduct, not by the mere fact that its head is visible among the people or willing to speak his mind. Justice Baffoe-Bonnie deserves to be assessed fairly, on the strength of his leadership, his actions and his record, rather than reduced to a political label that may say more about the prejudices of his critics than about the man himself.

Independence Must Work Both Ways

There is a deeper lesson here.
We cannot defend judicial independence only when a court reaches a decision we like and suddenly discover political interference when it reaches one we dislike.
Neither should the independence of a Chief Justice be judged merely by who nominated him.

Justice Baffoe-Bonnie was nominated by President Mahama. That is a constitutional fact. But nomination by a President does not make a Chief Justice the judicial representative of that President.

Indeed, upon assuming office, Justice Baffoe-Bonnie publicly pledged to uphold the rule of law, respect the separation of powers, protect the Constitution and preserve the independence of judges from improper influence and that is what is being done against all odds.

Those commitments must ultimately be measured against his record.
So far, the decisions concerning Jean Mensa, her deputies and Kissi Agyebeng provide important evidence. When petitions against politically sensitive officeholders reached his desk, the constitutional threshold, rather than presumed political convenience, determined the outcome.
That fact should matter to both his supporters and his critics.

Let History Judge Him on the Evidence
I do not suggest that Justice Paul Kwadwo Baffoe-Bonnie, or indeed any Chief Justice, should be insulated from criticism. Far from it.
The Judiciary exercises enormous constitutional power and must therefore remain open to rigorous public scrutiny. Judges, including Chief Justices, should be assessed by their decisions, administrative leadership, fidelity to the Constitution and commitment to justice.

But criticism must equally be fair.
If we accuse a Chief Justice of surrendering the Judiciary to the Executive, we should be prepared to reconcile that accusation with decisions in which the same Judiciary refuses outcomes that might politically benefit people associated with the government of the day.

Justice Baffoe-Bonnie’s tenure is still unfolding. History will eventually make the fuller assessment.
But if he sustains an independent Judiciary, deepens the reforms already underway, reduces delays, expands access to justice and preserves a Supreme Court whose decisions cannot simply be predicted according to which political party occupies the Jubilee House, then his tenure may indeed come to be regarded as one of the defining periods of judicial leadership in contemporary Ghana.

For me, that is the standard by which he should be judged.

Not rumours. Not political affiliation. Not who appointed him. Not his private associations or what he has said honestly somewhere to address a situation.
But whether, when the difficult moments came, the law was allowed to remain the law

Pluralistic ignorance occurs when people privately question or reject a group norm but mistakenly believe that most others support it (Mendes, Lopez-Valeiras & Lunkes, 2017). Because each person remains silent, the group’s false perception of consensus becomes self-reinforcing.

In supply chain management, this dynamic can allow outdated routines to survive. Employees, suppliers, and managers may doubt a forecast, sourcing policy, inventory assumption, or resilience plan, yet continue to support it publicly because they believe that senior leaders or other supply-chain partners endorse it. The direct literature linking pluralistic ignorance to supply chain management is still limited; research has not yet adequately connected the phenomenon’s causes and consequences to organizational management processes (Mendes et al., 2017).

When silence makes obsolete practices look rational

Supply chains depend on distributed knowledge. Information about supplier constraints, quality failures, demand changes, transport bottlenecks, and customer requirements is dispersed across functions and organizational boundaries. When people do not voice concerns, decision-makers receive an incomplete picture of reality.

Research on pluralistic ignorance in organizational settings shows that employees may suppress their genuine opinions when they believe their views are in the minority. This weakens knowledge sharing and can reduce the quality of group decisions because the adopted solution may not have genuine support across the organization (Chumg, 2024).

The same mechanism can operate between companies. A buyer may assume that a supplier accepts a delivery requirement; the supplier may assume that the buyer understands a capacity constraint; and both may avoid raising the issue because they believe the other side already has the necessary information. In supply-failure studies, these “hidden expectations” are described as a relational problem in which both parties have incomplete information about the other’s intentions and preferences (Kauppi et al., 2023). The result is not necessarily deception. It may be a shared failure to question assumptions.

This is particularly dangerous when a supply chain is successful for long enough to normalize a particular way of working. Low-cost sourcing, long lead times, single sourcing, narrow supplier relationships, or functionally isolated decision-making may become treated as common sense. The challenge is not merely to acquire new information. It is to make the organization willing to recognize that familiar knowledge may no longer fit its environment.

Unlearning is a strategic capability

Unlearning is the deliberate questioning and abandonment of knowledge, beliefs, or routines that obstruct adaptation. In supply chains, it may involve replacing adversarial supplier relationships with strategic collaboration, treating logistics as a source of business value rather than only a cost centre, or abandoning reactive risk management in favour of visibility beyond the first tier.

Practitioner evidence gathered during the COVID-19 period identified long lead times tied to offshore sourcing and “I win, you lose” supplier relationships as practices that organizations needed to reconsider (“Unlearning Supply Chain Management”, 2021).

Academic work in food supply chains makes the case more cautious. Strategic unlearning can enable product and process innovation, business-model change, sustainability, and responses to emerging customer requirements. Yet unlearning can also destroy knowledge that remains essential. Manning, Morris and Birchmore (2023) argue that organizations must manage unlearning, learning, and relearning as an integrated knowledge process rather than simply discarding the past.

This distinction matters because resilience is not the same as constant change. A resilient supply chain must know which routines are obsolete, which capabilities should be retained, and which new practices require testing before they are scaled. A 2026 study found that resilience and robustness emerged from multiple configurations of absorptive capacity, unlearning, resource reconfiguration, and supply-chain memory; no single capability was universally sufficient (Alvarenga & Andrade Guedes, 2026).

Learning across the Supply-Chain Network

Learning in supply chain management is interorganizational. It occurs between focal businesses, suppliers, customers, logistics providers, and other partners.

Silvestre, Gong, Bessant and Blome (2023) describe four forms of supply-chain learning: captive, consortium, selective, and distributed. Their concept of the “learning supply chain” goes beyond occasional training or post-event reviews. The entire network continuously develops and diffuses knowledge through different learning arrangements (Silvestre et al., 2023).

This perspective exposes a weakness in organizations affected by pluralistic ignorance. If silence is mistaken for agreement, learning networks become channels for reproducing established assumptions rather than challenging them. Learning can even be harmful when organizations absorb outdated or irrelevant knowledge. Supply-chain learning research warns that the wrong knowledge can direct a supply chain toward inappropriate actions or overload its capacity to identify information that is more relevant to its strategy and context (Silvestre et al., 2023).

The design of the network also matters. A simulation study of a multi-tier supply chain found that better communication and rewards for participating companies could reduce learning costs and increase knowledge spillovers. Training, technology support, and supplier preferences were also found to shape learning behaviour across the network (Gong et al., 2024). These findings suggest that companies cannot rely on goodwill alone. They must create incentives and communication structures that make it worthwhile to disclose problems, exchange knowledge, and challenge dominant assumptions.

Relearning after disruption

Relearning means turning revised understanding into dependable practice. A supply chain may recognize that its supplier map is incomplete, learn about an alternative source, and still fail to change its operating model. Relearning closes that gap by incorporating new knowledge into planning, contracts, routines, performance measures, and relationships.

Studies on paradox cognition and supply-chain resilience support this iterative view. A study of 277 Chinese manufacturers found that paradox cognition, or the ability to recognize and work through competing demands, enhanced organizational unlearning, which then promoted both proactive and reactive dimensions of supply-chain resilience. Market turbulence strengthened the relationship between paradox cognition and unlearning (Zhang, Zhang & Feng, 2024).

The implication is that resilience depends partly on the ability to hold competing objectives together: efficiency and flexibility, standardization and experimentation, cost control and redundancy, and local optimization and system-wide performance.

The evidence also counsels against treating unlearning as a guaranteed solution. In a survey of organizations in Germany and Austria during the COVID-19 crisis, organizational learning positively affected resilience, particularly adaptive capacity, but the proposed moderating effect of unlearning was not supported (Orth & Schuldis, 2021). The supply-chain lesson is to treat unlearning as a capability to be developed and evaluated, not as an automatic source of resilience.

Building a culture that can change its mind

Supply-chain leaders can reduce pluralistic ignorance by making disagreement visible and safe. Useful routines include anonymous challenge channels, rotating “devil’s advocate” roles, pre-mortems for sourcing and continuity plans, structured reviews of weak signals, and post-disruption discussions organized around three questions: what should stop, what should continue, and what should be redesigned?

These mechanisms work only when leaders distinguish silence from consensus. A meeting in which nobody objects does not demonstrate that a plan is understood or supported. Leaders should ask for independent judgments before group discussion, disclose uncertainty, invite evidence that would change the decision, and reward early escalation rather than retrospective blame. Such practices are consistent with studies showing that pluralistic ignorance is intensified by weak dialogue, restricted feedback, and power asymmetries, while inclusive and empowering leadership can help curb it (Mendes et al., 2017; Chumg, 2024).

Supply chains need to expose false consensus, unlearn routines that no longer fit, learn from partners and weak signals, and relearn by embedding tested alternatives. But they must preserve critical memory and avoid confusing novelty with improvement. Resilience comes from disciplined renewal: knowing when to challenge the status quo, what to retain, and how to make new knowledge usable across the entire supply-chain network.

By Elikem Desewu

Ghana’s industrialization journey may be entering a defining chapter. Ekumfi Fruits & Juices Limited is emerging as a potential model for turning development-finance investment into agricultural prosperity, youth employment, industrial expansion and export growth.

With Ghana EXIM Bank participation — its existing credit now restructured to approximately US$6 million — Ekumfi has built an industrial enterprise with an estimated asset value of US$53 million — a modern fruit-processing facility, Ghanaian juice brands, and a foundation for international market expansion.

Yet this substantial investment has lived with a contradiction.

Despite significant processing capacity, the company has been constrained by inadequate supplies of pineapple and other fruits, and by the 20% excise duty imposed on locally manufactured fruit juices in 2023. At times, production has been limited to roughly two days a week, leaving equipment and infrastructure underused.

The cost reaches well beyond the company. Farmers lose an established industrial buyer. Young people miss employment and enterprise opportunities. Ghana loses manufacturing output and export earnings.

Ekumfi’s challenge has never simply been the existence of a factory. It has been building the agricultural and financial ecosystem needed to keep that factory running at its potential.

Today, the government’s excise reforms, the Feed the Industries Programme and the 24-Hour Economy agenda create an opening to address those structural constraints.

The Excise Duty Removal Creates a New Opening

Finance Minister Dr Cassiel Ato Forson announced the abolition of the 20% excise duty on locally manufactured fruit juices in the 2026 Mid-Year Budget Review on 23 July. The exemption, enacted under the Excise Duty Act, 2026, took effect on 1 October 2026.

For Ekumfi, the change can improve price competitiveness, strengthen operating margins, stimulate consumer demand and free up room for reinvestment in agricultural production.

But removing the tax solves only one side of the industrial equation.

The more fundamental challenge is raw material. A processing plant cannot run three shifts a day when its agricultural supply chain supports only a fraction of installed capacity.

This is where Feed the Industries becomes decisive.

Feed the Industries: Linking Ghana’s Farms to Its Factories

The Feed the Industries Programme, under the 24-Hour Economy framework, is designed to connect agricultural production directly to industrial demand.

For Ekumfi, that means a coordinated fruit-supply system drawing on commercial estates, smallholder farmers, youth agricultural enterprises, out-grower cooperatives and agricultural service providers.

Management estimates that sustained 24-hour operations would require more than 9,000 acres of pineapple and other fruits.

Crucially, the land is already in place. Ekumfi has secured 9,500 acres for juice, tea and tepache feedstock — more than the full 24-hour requirement — with full capacity achievable within 36 months. The constraint is no longer land, but the planting finance, inputs and grower mobilization needed to bring it into production.

That is not merely an agricultural challenge. It is a major economic opportunity.

Rather than relying solely on company-owned plantations, Ekumfi can establish structured partnerships with thousands of farmers and young entrepreneurs growing fruit under agreed quality, delivery and pricing terms. The factory gains dependable supply; growers gain a defined industrial market.

Feed the Industries can turn Ekumfi’s raw-material shortage into rural wealth creation.

GH₵52,000 Per Acre: A New Opportunity for Youth and Pineapple Growers

The most compelling dimension of the proposed expansion is the opening it creates for youth, smallholders, landowners and agricultural entrepreneurs to participate directly in the pineapple value chain.

Under the proposed cultivation model, one acre of pineapple could generate an estimated GH₵52,000 in gross revenue per successful harvest cycle. Young people could start commercial farming on modest plots; existing growers could scale up.

If the full 9,000-acre requirement were planted with pineapple at this revenue level, gross farm-gate value could reach GH₵468 million per harvest cycle. Because Ekumfi also needs other fruits, the real mix will depend on acreage allocated to each crop.

The programme could be structured around one-acre, five-acre and ten-acre production units for young growers, backed by land access, improved planting material, technical assistance, mechanization and structured off take agreements.

The opportunity extends well beyond the farm gate: seedling multiplication, land preparation, irrigation, harvesting, transport, aggregation, farm management and agricultural technology could each support thousands of livelihoods.

Management estimates that the full Ekumfi value chain — nurseries, land preparation, cultivation, harvesting, haulage, aggregation, processing, packaging and distribution — could support around 18,000 jobs in the Central Region alone.

One distinction matters. GH₵52,000 is potential gross revenue, not guaranteed profit. Growers must cover cultivation, labour, inputs, financing and transport, and a pineapple cycle can run longer than a year.

Even so, the model shows how industrial demand can anchor commercial agriculture. Instead of simply urging young Ghanaians into farming, the country can offer them a defined industrial market, structured production support and a real pathway to commercial income.

From Two Days a Week to US$4 Million a Month

Management estimates that with adequate raw material, working capital and market access, sustained 24-hour production could deliver monthly turnover of about US$4 million — US$48 million a year.

Moving from two days a week toward continuous operation would sharply improve utilization of existing equipment, utilities, labour and infrastructure, while expanding market presence and multiplying demand for local produce.

The lesson for Ghana’s industrial agenda is clear: the country can unlock substantial value not only by building new factories, but by helping existing ones run at full capacity.

Could Ekumfi Repay Its EXIM Credit Within Two Years?

One of the most consequential implications concerns Ekumfi’s obligations to Ghana EXIM Bank.

At US$48 million in annual turnover, the company would generate materially stronger cash flow to support restructuring and repayment. Illustratively, a 15% free-cash-flow margin would yield about US$7.2 million before further financing needs or restrictions on distributions.

At that level, the restructured US$6 million EXIM credit could be cleared within 24 months. That means about US$3 million a year, or US$250,000 a month, which is less than half of the illustrative annual free cash flow. Even at half that margin (7.5%), annual cash generation of about US$3.6 million would still cover the principal schedule. A two-year plan repays EXIM in full while leaving headroom for working capital, cropping and interest, rather than sweeping every cedi to a single lender.

Restructuring the existing EXIM exposure into a US$6 million credit does two things. It gives Ekumfi a defined, serviceable obligation, and it leaves room for other financial institutions to participate, providing the working-capital, raw-material and expansion finance that no single lender should carry alone. The actual timeline will still depend on interest, operating margins, working-capital needs and agreed repayment terms.

The broader point stands: restoring industrial productivity offers development financiers a more credible recovery pathway than leaving major manufacturing assets idle. A structured recovery programme can align EXIM’s repayment interests with agricultural expansion, higher factory output and growing export revenue.

From Ghanaian Pineapples to a Global Juice Brand

Ekumfi’s processing platform can produce value-added beverages from pineapple, citrus, ginger, passion fruit and other local crops.

With adequate volumes, competitive pricing, consistent quality and established distribution partners, the company can extend its reach across African, European, North American and Middle Eastern markets.

The gains ripple through the economy: more fruit production creates farm income; more manufacturing creates industrial jobs; packaging and distribution support other businesses; exports earn foreign exchange.

This is the central promise of agricultural industrialization — converting locally grown crops into internationally marketed finished products, and capturing value through processing, branding and distribution rather than exporting raw produce.

Why Ekumfi Survived Where State-Led Factories Stalled

Ekumfi’s story becomes sharper when set beside the record of state-led agro-industrial investment in the same region and beyond.

The record is sobering. The state-owned Ayensu Starch Company has shut down repeatedly since 2002 over raw-material shortages and equipment failures. The Komenda Sugar Factory, rebuilt in 2016 for about US$35 million, has barely operated since. NABCO placed some 100,000 graduates in temporary public roles that ended without a pipeline into lasting enterprise. And under One District, One Factory (1D1F), more than 300 factories stand idle or unfinished today.

The common thread is not a shortage of public money. Over three decades and more, the state has committed capital to factories and programmes without the sustained private ownership, management discipline and equity at risk needed to keep them running when conditions turned difficult.

Ekumfi took a different route. Backed by private sponsors with their own capital committed, it has kept its factory, brands and markets alive through the excise burden, raw-material shortfalls and financing delays — and today sells Ghanaian juice at home and abroad.

That is a lesson the state should note. Rather than building and running factories on its own, or simply recovering legacy debt from the private ventures that survived, government and its development finance institutions should consider taking equity positions alongside committed private sponsors. Equity aligns the state with the upside as utilization rises, strengthens the balance sheet lenders look to, and leaves day-to-day management with operators who have proven they can keep a factory running. Ekumfi offers a ready test case.

A Practical Model for the 24-Hour Economy

Ekumfi can serve as a demonstration project for how Feed the Industries and the 24-Hour Economy work together. The model connects six elements:

• Agricultural expansion — develop 9,000+ acres of pineapple and other fruits through company estates, commercial growers and outgrower arrangements.
• Youth and farmer empowerment — enable growers to target gross crop revenue of up to GH₵52,000 per acre per successful harvest cycle.
• Industrial production — progressively raise factory utilization toward sustained 24-hour operation.
• Market development — expand domestic distribution and exports to support projected turnover of US$48 million a year.
• Financial recovery — service the restructured US$6 million EXIM credit from operating cash flow, while other institutions participate in funding growth.
• State equity partnership — convert public support into equity alongside private sponsors, sharing in the upside of a working factory rather than funding stalled ones.

Delivery requires collaboration among Ekumfi, Ghana EXIM Bank, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, the Ministry of Trade, Agribusiness and Industry, the 24-Hour Economy Authority, agricultural investors and commercial financiers — and a phased implementation plan with independently validated yields, acreage, processing capacity, customer demand and working-capital needs.

The Bigger Picture: Turning Industrial Investment Into National Wealth

Ekumfi’s story poses a question for Ghana’s development-finance strategy: what happens when the country invests in a major industrial asset but not in the supply chain needed to sustain it?

The answer is an underused factory, mounting financial pressure, lost farm income and missed exports.

The reverse is just as true. When agriculture, manufacturing, finance and markets are coordinated, the same investment becomes an engine of growth.

For young people, the opportunity can begin with a single acre of pineapple. For established farmers, it means scaling up with a dependable industrial buyer. For Ghana EXIM Bank, it offers a pathway to improved recovery through higher production. For Ghana, it demonstrates how Feed the Industries can turn agricultural potential into manufacturing output, export earnings and rural prosperity.

The Ekumfi Opportunity Is Bigger Than One Factory

Ghana does not need to abandon valuable industrial investments because they have faced difficulty. It needs to identify and remove the constraints holding them back.

For Ekumfi Fruits & Juices, that means connecting a modern processing factory to thousands of acres of productive farmland, empowering young growers and expanding markets for Ghanaian-made beverages — moving from limited weekly runs to 24-hour operation, from raw-material shortage to a structured supply chain, and from financial pressure to a firm foundation for repayment and export growth.

The factory has been built. The asset exists. The land has been acquired. The task now is to feed the factory, empower the farmers, create wealth for the youth and build a globally competitive Ghanaian juice brand.

That is the promise of Ekumfi under Ghana’s Feed the Industries and 24-Hour Economy agenda.

Following the appointment ceremony, the Head of Government stated that her team would work, in accordance with the High Royal Directives, to develop an ambitious programme that responds to citizens’ expectations.

The formation of the new government marks a significant stage in Morocco’s political landscape, with a renewed emphasis on political leadership, ministerial restructuring and the pursuit of tangible results. The new government is expected to bring together figures with established party affiliations and records of political activism, reflecting a return to a more explicitly political approach to government.

A key feature of this renewal is the introduction of new faces, particularly women and young people, alongside experienced figures tasked with ensuring continuity in public policy. This approach seeks to rejuvenate the ministerial elite, broaden representation in decision-making and bring fresh perspectives to the management of public affairs.

Beyond changes in personnel, the new government’s priorities are expected to centre on equality, development, territorial equity and the consolidation of the social state. These objectives reflect the broader ambition of addressing regional disparities, improving living conditions and ensuring a more equitable distribution of the benefits of development across the country.

The government’s new structure is also expected to promote a more integrated approach to policymaking, organised around renewed areas of focus and clearly defined responsibilities. Particular emphasis will be placed on serious and responsible government performance, accountability and measurable results, with the aim of strengthening public-sector efficiency and ensuring that government action delivers tangible benefits for citizens.

Women and young people are expected to play an important role in this process of ministerial renewal. Their inclusion offers an opportunity to diversify the profiles represented within the government, encourage the emergence of new political and administrative talent, and strengthen the connection between public institutions and citizens’ aspirations.

At the policy level, several strategic priorities are expected to shape the government’s programme, including gender equality, artificial intelligence, public-sector efficiency, food sovereignty, innovation and social dialogue. These priorities reflect the need to respond to emerging economic and technological challenges while addressing social concerns and strengthening national resilience.

Institutionally, the new government’s architecture provides for delegated ministers serving within sectoral ministries, while the option of establishing Secretariats of State has been set aside. This approach is intended to streamline government structures, improve coordination between departments and strengthen the implementation of sectoral policies.

Ultimately, the new government’s formation represents more than a change in ministerial personnel. It reflects an effort to renew political leadership, strengthen the effectiveness of public action and establish a government programme capable of responding to citizens’ expectations. As the Head of Government emphasised, the team’s work will be guided by the High Royal Directives and the development of an ambitious programme. The success of this new phase will depend on the government’s ability to translate these orientations into concrete achievements in equality, development, social justice and improved public services.

West Africa’s economic future depends on how well we turn ambition into sustainable livelihoods. Yet for decades, we have tended to talk about economic opportunity in fairly narrow terms.

Study hard. Get qualifications. Find a good job. Build a career.

It remains a perfectly valid aspiration. But across West Africa, it cannot be the only route we prepare people for.

Our region is young, ambitious and increasingly connected. Every year, millions of young people enter working age with expectations that are fundamentally different from those of the generation before them. Women are seeking greater economic independence. Technology is lowering some barriers to participation while creating entirely new forms of work.

Yet the formal economy cannot absorb everyone who wants, or needs, to participate in it. In a July 2024 article, the World Bank reported that six million young people enter the labour force each year across Western and Central Africa, while only about half a million new jobs are created.

The question we therefore need to ask is not simply: How do we create more jobs?

It is also: How do we widen the number of legitimate, responsible pathways through which people can participate in the economy?

Economic participation is bigger than employment

A healthy economy needs salaried employees. It needs large companies and public institutions. It needs engineers, teachers, doctors, bankers and civil servants.

But it also needs small traders, independent professionals, farmers, creators, artisans, technology entrepreneurs, family businesses, consultants, distributors and people providing services within their communities.

Many West Africans already earn their livelihoods in these ways.

For some, these livelihoods are a deliberate choice; for others, they reflect limited alternatives. Our focus should be on helping people move from informal and vulnerable economic activity towards more productive, skilled and secure participation.

That requires a broader definition of entrepreneurship.

Not every entrepreneur will build a technology unicorn or raise millions of dollars in venture capital. Most never will.

Entrepreneurship can begin much more simply: identifying a need, providing a product or service, finding customers, managing income and expenses, and gradually building something sustainable.

For someone who has never had access to formal employment, even that first step can be significant. But starting a business is only the beginning. Access to customers, suitable finance and practical support helps determine whether it can become a sustainable livelihood. More predictable trade policies aligned with the African Continental Free Trade Area could also help smaller businesses reach wider markets, as the World Bank has highlighted.

Opportunity must be responsible

Expanding access to entrepreneurship cannot mean lowering the standards around it.

As more people search online for ways to earn additional income, the distinction between a genuine economic opportunity and an unrealistic promise becomes increasingly important.

No legitimate form of entrepreneurship guarantees success.

Income depends on many factors: effort, capability, demand, competition, experience and timing. Anyone entering an entrepreneurial activity deserves to understand clearly what is required, what it costs, where the risks lie and how income is generated.

Businesses also have a responsibility to address exaggerated income claims and misleading offers made by those representing them. Clear information and accessible complaints procedures should be part of every opportunity.

Entrepreneurship should expand people’s choices, not exploit their aspirations.

Governments, businesses, civil society and law-enforcement agencies therefore have a shared interest in creating environments where legitimate opportunities can grow while fraudulent ones become harder to operate.

Skills may matter as much as capital

When entrepreneurship is discussed, the conversation often begins with access to finance.

Financing matters, but someone starting a small business also needs to understand customers, communicate effectively, manage cash flow, use digital tools, negotiate, solve problems and build trust.

These capabilities remain valuable even when a particular venture does not succeed.

Selling responsibly can strengthen communication. Managing customers develops service skills. Tracking income and expenses builds financial discipline and helps people distinguish revenue from profit. Building networks develops relationship skills. Using social platforms for business can build digital capability.

We should therefore think beyond simply creating entrepreneurs and focus on creating economically capable individuals.

People may move between employment, entrepreneurship and independent work several times during their lives. The skills developed in one setting can travel with them into the next.

Women need pathways designed around reality

Across our region, women participate extensively in commerce and informal enterprise, yet their economic potential remains constrained by unequal access to finance, networks, technology, training and, in many cases, time. The need to widen participation is particularly evident among young women. ILOSTAT’s May 2026 analysis, using 2022 data, found that the employment-to-population ratio for women aged 15 to 29 in Senegal was just 22.5 per cent.

Economic models that offer greater flexibility can help widen participation. But flexibility alone is not empowerment.

Women also need skills, financial literacy, digital tools, mentoring and credible business networks. Training schedules and delivery should recognise care responsibilities. The opportunities available to them must also be transparent and financially viable.

If entrepreneurship is to contribute meaningfully to women’s economic participation, we should look beyond how many women start businesses and ask whether those businesses strengthen their skills, income security and economic independence.

Digital access changes the possibilities

Technology is lowering some barriers to economic activity. BCEAO, the Central Bank of West African States, reports that merchant acceptance points for electronic money in the West African Economic and Monetary Union increased from approximately 1.75 million in 2023 to 3.71 million in 2024. This growth in payment acceptance locations shows the expansion of infrastructure for digital commerce, although a single business may account for more than one acceptance point.

A smartphone can now provide access to customers, payments, education, logistics, financial services and markets that were difficult for small entrepreneurs to reach a generation ago. Artificial intelligence could extend these possibilities further.

A small business owner can increasingly access tools for translation, marketing, design, customer service, bookkeeping and research. Their usefulness depends on affordability, relevant skills and checking the accuracy of what they produce.

But connectivity alone is not enough. People also need the skills to use technology productively. Entrepreneurship programmes should therefore teach not only how to start a business, but how to operate in an increasingly digital marketplace.

We need an ecosystem, not a single solution

There is no single model that will solve West Africa’s employment challenge.

Formal employment, vocational training, small-business development, agriculture, technology startups, creative industries, independent professional work, social enterprise and responsible direct selling can all contribute.

The real objective should be to build an ecosystem in which people have more credible choices.

Governments can create enabling regulation and infrastructure. Educational institutions can equip young people with adaptable skills. Financial institutions can improve access to responsible capital. Businesses can create platforms for participation and invest in training. Civil society and the media can help people distinguish genuine opportunities from fraudulent ones.

Those of us in the private sector must also accept that inclusion comes with responsibility. At QNET, our FinGreen programme focuses on financial literacy through education and training, particularly for young adults and communities with limited access to resources. Its purpose reflects the broader need to help people make informed financial decisions. Training, however, must never be presented as a guarantee of income.

Opening a door is not enough. We must be clear about what lies behind it.

West Africa does not lack ambition. Spend time in Dakar, Accra, Abidjan, Lagos or Lomé and you encounter it everywhere — in markets, small businesses, technology hubs, university campuses and digital platforms.

Our challenge is to turn more of that ambition into sustainable economic participation. That begins by moving beyond the assumption that everyone must follow the same economic path, while continuing to invest in good jobs.

A resilient economy is one in which people have several legitimate opportunities, the skills to make them productive and the knowledge to choose among them. That is how West Africa can turn more of its ambition into lasting economic progress.

About the Author

Cherif Sarr is Regional General Manager for Central and West Africa at QNET, an international direct selling company specialising in wellness and lifestyle products. He oversees the company’s growth across the region, with a focus on social commerce and expanding responsible microentrepreneurship opportunities in emerging economies.

Ghana’s mines spend billions of dollars annually on goods and services, yet many critical inputs are still manufactured abroad. A deliberate mining-led industrialisation strategy could turn this purchasing power into factories, skilled jobs, tax revenues, foreign-exchange savings and a new export industry serving West Africa.

Every mine is also a major industrial consumer. It buys chemicals, machinery, pipes, valves, wear parts, processing materials and engineering services. Yet many of these inputs ultimately originate from factories thousands of kilometres away. This represents one of Ghana’s greatest untapped industrial opportunities.

According to the Ghana Chamber of Mines, mining companies spent approximately US$3.46 billion on goods and services in 2025. The Chamber has consequently called for Ghana to progress from local procurement towards actual local manufacturing.

Government should translate this enormous purchasing power into a deliberate Mining Inputs Industrialisation Programme, beginning with three anchor industries: activated carbon; sodium cyanide and caustic soda; and mining engineering components.

From coconut shells to gold production

Activated carbon is essential to gold processing. Ghana has the agricultural resources to manufacture it from materials including coconut and palm-kernel shells. Indeed, the Chamber has long identified activated carbon and caustic soda as strategic opportunities for domestic production.

Imagine the value chain: farmers produce coconuts; aggregators purchase shells that might otherwise have little value; Ghanaian factories process them into activated carbon; laboratories certify the product; and mines purchase it locally.

An industrial-scale operation could potentially target US$25–40 million in annual sales, depending on capacity and market penetration, while supporting an estimated 250–400 direct jobs and potentially thousands of agricultural, collection, transport and processing livelihoods.

The significance goes beyond import substitution. Ghana could develop an entirely new connection between agriculture and mining. The value chain is endless.

A US$197 million regional chemical market

The second opportunity is even bigger. World Bank WITS/UN Comtrade data show that Ghana imported approximately US$69.1 million of sodium cyanide in 2024. Burkina Faso imported US$66.2 million and Côte d’Ivoire US$61.8 million. Together, the three countries imported almost US$197 million in a single year. The WITS ranks Ghana, Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire as the 3rd, 4th and 5th largest reported importers globally in that 2024 dataset, behind Peru and Canada. This makes a Ghana-based sodium cyanide plant potentially much more compelling as a West African industrial/export project, rather than merely an import-substitution factory for Ghana.

Why should West African gold continue depending so heavily on chemicals manufactured outside the subregion?

Encouragingly, the Government’s 24-Hour Economy and Accelerated Export Development Authority and Petrochemical Holding signed an MoU in June 2026 for an integrated Ghanaian sodium cyanide and chlor-alkali/caustic soda manufacturing complex.

This project deserves urgency. A commercially competitive complex serving Ghana and neighbouring mining economies could potentially target US$120–200 million or more in annual sales, while creating perhaps 400–600 specialised direct jobs and considerably more indirect employment. It could transform Ghana from an importer into a strategic supplier to West African mining.

Build the components that keep mines running

The third factory should be an integrated mining engineering manufacturing complex. It could manufacture conveyor components, wear plates and liners, valves, mining mesh, ground-support systems, bolts, pump components and fabricated replacement parts.

The arithmetic underscores the scale of the opportunity. Capturing just two per cent of the mining industry’s estimated US$3.46 billion annual expenditure on goods and services could translate into nearly US$70 million in economic activity retained within Ghana. Increasing that share to five per cent could generate approximately US$173 million in domestic economic activity. While these figures illustrate market potential rather than projected revenues, they demonstrate the significant opportunity to leverage mining demand to stimulate local manufacturing, create jobs, retain foreign exchange and build competitive Ghanaian industries capable of serving both the domestic and regional mining markets.

A properly structured engineering complex could potentially create 400–800 direct jobs, alongside thousands of opportunities in fabrication, machining, transport, maintenance and SME supply chains.

Government should invest, not necessarily operate

Government need not become a factory manager. Instead, I propose an equity model involving 50 per cent for a strategic technical investor, 20 per cent for Ghanaian private businesses, 20 per cent for Government through an appropriate investment vehicle, and 10 per cent collectively for host communities/local assemblies and other qualifying domestic institutional investors.

The strategic investor contributes technology, capital and access to international markets. Ghanaian businesses build domestic entrepreneurial capacity. Government’s participation provides strategic alignment while creating the possibility of dividend income. Community participation ensures that industrialisation creates local ownership rather than simply locating factories near communities.

Mining companies could underpin the model through transparent, competitive long-term offtake arrangements, provided Ghanaian products meet required price, safety and quality standards.

The fiscal dividend

These factories could ultimately generate a combined US$215–415 million or more in annual sales, based on illustrative market-capture scenarios, while potentially creating over 1,000 direct industrial jobs and several thousand indirect opportunities.

Government would benefit through corporate taxes, PAYE, supplier taxes and, where it holds equity, dividends. Ghana’s tax framework also provides location-based incentives for manufacturing. According to the Ghana Revenue Authority, qualifying manufacturing companies located in regional capitals outside Accra and Tema benefit from a reduced corporate income tax rate, while those located outside Accra, Tema and the regional capitals may qualify for a 12.5 per cent rate, subject to applicable tax laws and eligibility requirements.

Under reasonable profitability assumptions, the three factories could potentially contribute several million dollars annually in corporate income taxes alone when fully operational. Exports could add foreign exchange while import substitution reduces pressure on Ghana’s reserves.

But the bigger prize is structural transformation.

Mining should not exist as an island from which minerals leave Ghana while the machinery, chemicals and technology required to produce them arrive through our ports. It should become an anchor customer for Ghanaian industrialisation.

We have the mines. We have the market. We have universities and research institutions. We have ports giving us access to Burkina Faso, Mali and other mining economies, while Côte d’Ivoire lies next door. Ghana’s local-content framework already seeks to build competitive domestic mining-support industries and employment.

The question is whether we can connect these pieces with deliberate industrial policy. For more than a century, Ghana’s mining story has largely been about what we take from beneath the ground. The next chapter should be about what we build above it. And perhaps Ghana’s greatest mining opportunity is no longer another gold mine. It is the factories that supply the mines.

Finance, Supply Chain and Total Rewards Professional

Executive Summary

The Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2026 (Act 1178) provides targeted relief to individual taxpayers and broadens access to Ghana’s presumptive tax regime for small businesses. The Act increases the annual tax-free threshold for resident individuals from GH¢5,880 to GH¢7,056 and raises the presumptive tax turnover threshold from GH¢500,000 to GH¢750,000. These changes are expected to improve disposable income, reduce compliance pressure for qualifying SMEs, and support a simpler tax administration framework.

Key Takeaways

• The tax-free threshold has increased by 20%, providing relief to all resident individual taxpayers.
• Minimum wage earners are effectively removed from the personal income tax net.
• The top marginal tax rate remains 35% for annual income above GH¢600,000.
• More SMEs may now qualify for the 3% presumptive tax regime because the turnover threshold has increased to GH¢750,000.
• Small businesses must still keep proper sales records and retain withholding tax certificates to avoid double payment.

1. Introduction

The Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2026 (Act 1178), assented to on 26 August 2026, amends the Income Tax Act, 2015 (Act 896). The amendment updates the First Schedule, which governs the graduated tax rates for resident individuals, and the Second Schedule, which determines the turnover threshold for presumptive taxation.

2. Revised Personal Income Tax Structure

The updated annual chargeable income bands for resident individuals are:

1. First GH¢7,056 – Nil
2. Next GH¢960 – 5%

iii. Next GH¢1,200 – 10%

17. Next GH¢34,800 – 17.5%
18. Next GH¢192,000 – 25%
19. Next GH¢363,984 – 30%

vii. Exceeding GH¢600,000 – 35%

3. Comparative Analysis with Previous Regime (Act 1111 of 2023)

Annual Individual Tax Rates Comparison Table

4. Impact by Taxpayer Category
5. a) Low-Income Earners (≤ GH¢7,056 p.a.)

The tax-free threshold has increased from GH¢5,880 to GH¢7,056 per annum, equivalent to a monthly increase from GH¢490 to GH¢588. This 20% adjustment removes minimum wage earners from the tax net and aligns the threshold with the 2026 National Daily Minimum Wage of GH¢21.77. Consequently, every resident individual taxpayer benefits from at least GH¢117.60 in annual tax relief.

1. b) Lower-Middle Income (GH¢7,057 – GH¢50,000 p.a.)

Although the 5%, 10%, and 17.5% bands have narrowed, taxpayers within this category still achieve net savings. For example, an employee with annual chargeable income of GH¢40,000 saves approximately GH¢250 under the revised structure. While the monthly impact is modest, it provides a positive improvement in disposable income and net take-home pay.

1. c) Middle to Upper-Middle Income (GH¢50,001 – GH¢600,000 p.a.)

The 25% band remains applicable up to GH¢192,000. The increased tax-free threshold substantially offsets the narrower middle bands, producing estimated annual savings of GH¢300 to GH¢600 for taxpayers in this income range. Employers may communicate this as a modest but positive net-pay adjustment in Total Rewards and compensation discussions.

1. d) High Income Earners (> GH¢600,000 p.a.)

The 35% top marginal rate continues to apply to annual chargeable income exceeding GH¢600,000, or GH¢50,000 per month. The rate has not increased, and the threshold has not been reduced. Therefore, any savings available to high-income earners arise only from the relief provided in the lower tax bands.

5. Presumptive Tax Amendment

Act 1178 further amends paragraph 5 of the Second Schedule by raising the presumptive tax turnover threshold from GH¢500,000 to GH¢750,000.

A business with annual turnover above GH¢20,000 but not exceeding GH¢750,000 remains subject to tax at 3% of turnover on a modified cash basis.

The expanded threshold brings more small businesses within the simplified 3% tax regime. SMEs in trading, retail, and services with turnover between GH¢500,000 and GH¢750,000 may now benefit from simplified compliance and reduced administrative requirements.

In practical terms, the amendment makes tax compliance easier for many small business operators.

Old Law: Businesses with annual sales above GH¢20,000 and up to GH¢500,000 could pay simplified tax at 3% of sales.

New Law (Act 1178): The qualifying threshold is now GH¢750,000.

Businesses with annual sales between GH¢20,000 and GH¢750,000 may therefore qualify to pay 3% of turnover.

Businesses with annual turnover of GH¢20,000 or less generally fall under the presumptive tax based on instalment category, rather than the 3% turnover-based category. The Ghana Revenue Authority’s Modified Taxation Scheme describes this category as applying to businesses with average annual turnover not exceeding GH¢20,000 over three consecutive years. Accordingly, a business with turnover of GH¢20,000 or less would ordinarily not pay the 3% turnover tax; instead, it may be assessed under the instalment-based presumptive tax framework, subject to GRA classification and registration requirements.

6. Presumptive Tax Explained for Small Business Owners

Turnover means the total money your business receives from sales during the year. It is not your profit. For example, if you sell provisions, spare parts, clothing, food, or provide services such as masonry, carpentry, sewing, hairdressing, or driving, your turnover is the total amount customers pay you.

Modified cash basis means GRA taxes the money you actually receive, whether in cash, by MoMo, or through a bank transfer. If a customer buys on credit and has not paid, that amount is not counted until payment is received.

1. How to calculate the 3% tax:

Add up your annual sales, multiply the amount by 3, and divide the result by 100.

• Example 1: Provision Shop at Kaneshie

Auntie Ama’s total sales from January to December amount to GH¢100,000.

Her tax = 3% of GH¢100,000 = GH¢3,000 for the whole year.

This means she pays GH¢3,000 for the year, without preparing a complicated tax computation.

• Example 2: Spare Parts Dealer at Abossey Okai

Kofi’s total sales amount to GH¢600,000 for the year.

Old law: He did not qualify for the simplified 3% system and would have been required to follow the standard business tax regime, including more detailed accounting obligations.

New law: He now qualifies for the simplified 3% system.

His tax = 3% of GH¢600,000 = GH¢18,000 for the whole year.

1. Who may qualify?

• Your annual sales are more than GH¢20,000 but not more than GH¢750,000.
• You operate as a sole proprietor, trader, artisan, or small service provider.
• You are not required to register for VAT.

1. Main benefits for small businesses:

• Easy to understand: You do not need to calculate profit, expenses, rent, or deductions. The tax is simply 3% of sales.
• Potentially lower cost: For many small businesses, paying 3% of sales may be cheaper than paying tax on profit under the standard regime.
• Less paperwork: The system reduces the need for detailed accounts and may lower accounting costs.

1. Practical steps for small business owners:

• Keep a simple sales book and record each sale every day.
• Add up your sales at the end of the year.
• If your sales fall between GH¢20,000 and GH¢750,000, visit the nearest GRA office and ask to be assessed under the 3% presumptive tax regime.
• Keep receipts and records for all sales.

This amendment is particularly relevant for micro and small businesses in commercial centres such as Makola, Kantamanto, Abossey Okai, and Kumasi Central Market, as it allows more operators to remain under the simplified tax system.

7. Important Note for SMEs Supplying Companies and Institutions

Small businesses that supply goods or services to companies, schools, hospitals, or public institutions should note that withholding tax may still be deducted at the applicable rate.

• Goods: 3%
• Services: 7.5%
• Works: 5%

Example: If you supply stationery valued at GH¢10,000, the buyer pays you GH¢9,700 and gives you a withholding tax certificate for GH¢300.

What this means for businesses on the 3% presumptive tax regime:

• The deduction still applies, so the supplier receives less cash upfront.
• The deduction is not an additional tax. It is treated as a tax credit. For example, if the annual 3% presumptive tax is GH¢3,000 and the business holds withholding tax certificates worth GH¢1,000, only the GH¢2,000 balance is payable to GRA.
• If certificates are misplaced or returns are not properly filed, the business may effectively pay tax twice.
• Payment under the 3% presumptive tax regime does not automatically exempt a business from withholding tax deductions. Only an exemption letter from the Commissioner-General can stop the deduction.

Practical advice: Keep every withholding tax certificate. Where several customers deduct withholding tax, the business may already have prepaid a substantial portion of its presumptive tax liability. All certificates should be submitted at year end.

8. Conclusion and Recommendations

Act 1178 is a relief-focused amendment with clear implications for employees, employers, and small businesses. By increasing the tax-free threshold, the Act provides measurable relief to resident individual taxpayers while preserving the existing top marginal rate structure. By expanding the presumptive tax threshold to GH¢750,000, it also brings more SMEs within a simplified tax framework. Employers should update PAYE computation tables in line with the revised First Schedule. Qualifying SMEs should also review their turnover, strengthen record-keeping, and confirm their eligibility for the expanded presumptive tax regime.

References:

Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2026 (Act 1178)

Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2023 (Act 1111)

First Schedule of Income Tax Act, 2015 (Act 896), as amended

Second Schedule of Income Tax Act, 2015 (Act 896), as amended

Section 7 of Income Tax Act, 2015 (Act 896), as amended

https://gra.gov.gh/domestic-tax/tax-types/individual/modified-taxation-scheme/

https://www.glmis.gov.gh/

This position was expressed in a joint communiqué signed following talks held Monday in New York, on the sidelines of the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly, between Morocco’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccan Expatriates, Nasser Bourita, and his Chilean counterpart, Francisco Pérez Mackenna.
The meeting was attended by the President of the Republic of Chile, José Antonio Kast.

The joint communiqué further states that “Chile has decided to translate its support into bilateral action and will promote economic and trade cooperation opportunities in the Moroccan Sahara region to strengthen investment, trade, and productive development.”

It also states that Chile “welcomes Security Council Resolution 2797/2025 and endorses it, joining the calls for the parties to engage in negotiations without preconditions, on the basis of Morocco’s autonomy proposal, with a view to reaching a definitive political solution acceptable to all parties.”

During the meeting, the two ministers also signed the Terms of Reference to launch negotiations on a free trade agreement between the two countries.

Every human life eventually comes to an end. Yet some lives produce ideas, institutions and possibilities that continue long after the individual is gone.

This is the deeper meaning of the familiar declaration:

“Nkrumah Never Dies.”

It does not deny the physical death of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah. It declares that the value generated by his life did not disappear with him.

Nkrumah became more than a man. He became part of the accumulated intelligence of Ghana and Africa.

A life larger than its time

Nkrumah belonged to a generation confronted by a question that once appeared almost impossible:

Could an African people govern themselves and determine their own future?

His answer was not merely theoretical. He helped transform that possibility into political reality.

Ghana’s independence in 1957 was therefore more than the birth of a nation. It was evidence. It demonstrated that colonial rule was not permanent and that freedom could move from aspiration to achievement.

Once that possibility had been demonstrated, other African nations did not have to begin from the same psychological starting point. Ghana’s independence became part of their inheritance.

This is Continuity at work.

The value of an achievement is not limited to the person who achieves it. When its knowledge, courage and example survive, others begin from a different starting point.

The continuity of possibility

Before independence, freedom could be dismissed as a dream. After independence, it became a precedent.

Nkrumah helped move African self-government from the realm of imagination into the realm of demonstrated possibility. His achievement changed what others believed could be done.

That may be one of the highest forms of leadership: not merely exercising power, but expanding the horizon of possibility for those who come afterwards.

A generation can inherit roads, schools, factories and institutions. But it can also inherit confidence.

It can inherit the knowledge that difficult systems can be challenged, that inherited conditions can be changed and that Africans can imagine a future larger than the one handed to them.

Continuity does not require perfection

To honour Nkrumah through the lens of Continuity does not require us to pretend that every policy was successful or that every decision was beyond criticism.

Continuity is not the preservation of a person as an untouchable monument. It is the preservation of valuable state.

A mature nation must be able to separate enduring value from historical limitation. It must retain the courage, ambition and long-range thinking of its leaders while learning honestly from their mistakes.

To remember without examining is worship.

To examine only to condemn is waste.

The purpose of national memory is to preserve what remains valuable, understand what failed and allow future generations to begin with the benefit of both.

The unfinished African project

Nkrumah understood that Ghana’s independence could not be secure in an Africa that remained politically fragmented, economically dependent and institutionally weak.

That question remains alive.

Can African nations convert political freedom into economic capability? Can the continent build institutions that preserve knowledge across generations? Can it integrate its markets, develop its own productive capacity and turn its natural and human resources into lasting prosperity?

These are not merely questions from Nkrumah’s time. They are questions transferred to ours.

Every generation inherits an unfinished assignment. It must decide whether to continue the work, abandon it or reduce it to ceremonial remembrance.

If Nkrumah survives only in statues, slogans and annual speeches, then his memory has been preserved but his capability has not.

True Continuity requires more.

It requires us to transfer ambition into institutions, independence into productive capacity, education into innovation and African solidarity into practical cooperation.

The responsibility of remembrance

September 21 should therefore be more than a day for remembering when Nkrumah was born. It should be a day for asking what remains alive from the possibilities he opened.

What have we preserved?

What have we lost?

What have we improved?

What unfinished work are we prepared to carry forward?

A nation does not truly honour its founders by repeatedly describing what they did. It honours them by ensuring that the valuable state they created continues to generate capability.

The greatest tribute to Nkrumah is not to reproduce his era. Ghana and Africa face different conditions today and require new institutions, new technologies and new forms of leadership.

The task is not to preserve his form.

It is to preserve and advance the valuable state represented by his courage, vision, intellectual confidence and belief in Africa’s capacity to determine its own future.

Nkrumah never dies

A person truly disappears when everything valuable generated by that life is forgotten, abandoned or rendered incapable of influencing the future.

Nkrumah remains present whenever an African believes that the continent can shape its own destiny.

He remains present whenever Ghana chooses ambition over resignation.

He remains present whenever political freedom is converted into economic and intellectual capability.

He remains present whenever one generation transfers confidence, knowledge and possibility to the next.

That is why the slogan endures.

Nkrumah never dies—not because a human being can escape mortality, but because a life that enters the continuity of a people can continue working long after the person is gone.