{"id":186707,"date":"2025-09-28T03:11:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-28T03:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/186707\/"},"modified":"2025-09-28T03:11:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T03:11:10","slug":"prof-bokpin-backs-world-bank-on-the-cause-of-ghanas-2022-economic-collapse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/186707\/","title":{"rendered":"Prof Bokpin backs World Bank on the cause of Ghana\u2019s 2022 economic collapse"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanaweb.com\/GhanaHomePage\/business\/Prof-Bokpin-backs-World-Bank-on-the-cause-of-Ghana-s-2022-economic-collapse-2002591?gallery=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/77855090.295.jpg\" alt=\"Prof Godfred Bokpin is an economist\" title=\"Prof Godfred Bokpin is an economist\" width=\"295\" height=\"162\" \/> <\/a>Prof Godfred Bokpin is an economist<\/p>\n<p id=\"article-123\">An economist, Professor Godfred Bokpin, has backed the World Bank\u2019s assertions that Ghana\u2019s 2022 economic crisis was the result of years of poor fiscal management, rather than external shocks.<\/p>\n<p>According to him, the meltdown was \u201can accident waiting to happen\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe World Bank is right. COVID-19 did not initiate Ghana\u2019s economic vulnerability. It only magnified it. The real cracks were already visible by the third quarter of 2021,\u201d he said, according to a myjoyonline.com report.<\/p>\n<p>According to him, when investors shut Ghana out of the international capital markets in 2021 after spotting deep weaknesses in the economy, it was the moment the cracks in the economy appeared. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanaweb.com\/GhanaHomePage\/business\/Ghana-s-economic-crisis-was-homegrown-not-caused-by-Covid-or-Ukraine-war-World-Bank-2002415\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ghana&#8217;s economic crisis was homegrown, not caused by Covid or Ukraine war &#8211; World Bank<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cBy 2019, the government\u2019s own debt sustainability analysis showed nearly all indicators had been breached. Yet debts taken by state enterprises such as Cocobod were kept off the books to create a false impression of stability,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n<p>Prof Bokpin pointed to the central bank\u2019s extraordinary financing of government operations after Ghana lost market access. <\/p>\n<p>He disclosed that the Bank of Ghana printed more than GH\u00a240 billion, with the government\u2019s exposure to the bank eventually hitting GH\u00a277.6 billion, an amount that later had to be restructured.<\/p>\n<p>By the time the IMF stepped in, Ghana\u2019s debt-to-GDP ratio had soared to 109% in present value terms, while the debt service-to-revenue ratio had climbed to between 22% and 25%, well above the 18% sustainability threshold.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOnce we lost market access, we were exposed both internationally and domestically. We were priced out of long-term borrowing and forced to rely on short-term treasury bills,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>For Prof Bokpin, the 2022 collapse was not the fault of COVID-19 or the Russia-Ukraine War. <\/p>\n<p>Instead, he said it reflected years of fiscal indiscipline, poor debt management, and a lack of accountability.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is not necessarily COVID that exposed us. We had created this ourselves, and it was only a matter of time,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n<p>SSD\/AE<\/p>\n<p>Watch the latest Health Focus on PCOS below<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Prof Godfred Bokpin is an economist An economist, Professor Godfred Bokpin, has backed the World Bank\u2019s assertions that&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":129565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[28,101],"class_list":["post-186707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}