{"id":95196,"date":"2015-02-28T07:28:01","date_gmt":"2015-02-28T07:28:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=95196"},"modified":"2015-02-28T07:37:55","modified_gmt":"2015-02-28T07:37:55","slug":"fitch-waters-down-effects-of-imf-ghana-agreement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=95196","title":{"rendered":"Fitch waters down effects of IMF, Ghana agreement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>International rating agency Fitch has said it will be \u201cchallenging\u201d for Ghana to stick to the<a href=\"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/2015\/02\/26\/confirmed-ghana-gets-us940m-in-imf-bailout-deal\/#sthash.8gVsF5Yt.dpbs\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"color: #666699;\"><strong> 3-year staff level agreement<\/strong> <\/span><\/a>it has reached with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) worth $940 million.<\/p>\n<p>[contextly_sidebar id=&#8221;mRI8QR36lvyRzr46pusDkhPCyr2wEsun&#8221;]The programme will seek to restrain, prioritise government\u2019s public expenditure, increase tax collection and strengthen the effectiveness of the Bank of Ghana&#8217;s monetary policy.<\/p>\n<p>Fitch described the targets as \u201cambitious\u201d and believes ahead of the 2016 elections, it will be difficult for the government to stick to the programme.<\/p>\n<p>Already, the\u00a0Finance Minister Seth Tekper has <a href=\"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/2015\/02\/27\/2012-election-expenditure-not-cause-of-ghanas-economic-woes-terkper\/#sthash.WxbbWCSJ.dpbs\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"color: #666699;\"><strong>vehemently rejected claims<\/strong> <\/span><\/a>that Ghana\u2019s current economic woes are\u00a0because of excessive spending in the 2012 election year.<\/p>\n<p>It was however quick to say that the agreement will \u201cease short-term government and external financing pressures.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This according to Fitch will also \u201cprovide an impetus for donors to re-engage with Ghana, providing much needed foreign currency.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Government has agreed to cut expenditure in response to lower oil prices, as part of its deal with the IMF.<\/p>\n<p>Fitch forecasts a deficit of 8% of GDP in 2015 but IMF has projected that the deficit will narrow to 3.5% of GDP by 2017.<\/p>\n<p>Fitch thinks that projection is \u201ctoo optimistic\u201d given the deepening electricity crisis, which could drag growth lower, and the likely pressure that the upcoming elections will exert on spending.<\/p>\n<p>The IMF forcasts the budget deficit narrowing to about 7.5% of GDP in 2015, down from the 9.5% in 2014.<\/p>\n<p>This is higher than the deficit target of 6.5% announced in the 2015 budget in December and reflects the impact of lower oil prices and weaker growth.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>By: Nana Boakye-Yiadom\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>International rating agency Fitch has said it will be \u201cchallenging\u201d for Ghana to stick to the 3-year staff level agreement it has reached with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) worth $940 million. [contextly_sidebar id=&#8221;mRI8QR36lvyRzr46pusDkhPCyr2wEsun&#8221;]The programme will seek to restrain, prioritise government\u2019s public expenditure, increase tax collection and strengthen the effectiveness of the Bank of Ghana&#8217;s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":32797,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[43,38,21,4],"class_list":["post-95196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-foresight-medical-center","tag-palaver-newspaper","tag-psychiatric","tag-st-augustines-college"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=95196"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95196\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=95196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=95196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=95196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}