Trade and Industry Minister Dr Ekow Spio – Garbrah has declared war on the country’s high interest rates.
The move seeks to push down the interest rates which are one of the highest in the world.
Dr Ekow Spio – Garbrah says the business community and all Ghanaians must join in the war to push the rates down.
Ghana has one of the highest interest rates in the world, average rates are hovering around 35 percent.
Speaking at the Graphic Business- Fidelity Bank breakfast meeting which focused on the role of SMEs in Ghana’s economic development Dr
Spio – Garbrah said banks in the country must push their rates down soon or face their wrath which takes effect on first of January next year.
We will be declaring a war on high interest rates, everybody, beginning from January first. so we are giving the banks notice, so they can begin
taking appropriate measures. We are tired of structurally high interest rates.
He adds that ‘Ghana is one of very few countries in the world where interest rates for more than fifteen to twenty years have been above 10
percent’. ‘ All my adult life we have had high interest rates and yet elsewhere people are borrowing at zero percent’.
But the Managing Director of savings and loans company, Pro Credit, Sarah Tsien Zetterli warn against the move.
According to her government must first guarantee an enabling environment for small and medium scale institutions by ensuring reliable supply
of electricity and basic infrastructure.
By: Vivian Kai Mensah/citifmonline.com/Ghana