Dr. Maxwell Opoku-Afari – First Deputy Director of Bank of Ghana
The Bank of Ghana (BoG) has announced that inflation would trend back towards the medium-term horizon over the next four quarters.
According to the Bank of Ghana, the latest data shows that headline inflation rose sharply to 19.4 percent in March 2022 from 15.7 percent in February on the back of a significant increase in food inflation.
In addition to these trends, there are significant upside risks to the inflation outlook, including increased commodity prices, particularly crude oil, and intensified supply disruptions.
In March 2022, the inflation rate reached an all-time high of 19.4 percent from 15.7 percent in February.
The figure has largely been attributed to the global Coronavirus pandemic and the conflict between Russia and Ukraine that has affected the prices of commodities on the international market.
At the moment, headline inflation has shifted above the upper band of the medium-term target, driven mainly by food prices, upward adjustments in ex-pump petroleum prices, transport costs, and pass-through of exchange rate depreciation.
However, Dr. Maxwell Opoku-Afari, addressing journalists, in a speech read on his behalf by the Director of Research at the BoG, Philip Abradu-Otoo during a 2-day training workshop to train members of Journalists for Business Advocacy (JBA) said the BoG foresees inflation returning to the medium-term horizon in the next four quarters.
He explained that the remarkable resilience exhibited by the banking sector over the past two years could be attributed to the comprehensive financial sector reforms that took place before the Covid-19 pandemic struck in 2020.
Dr. Afari further assured that the banking sector continues to remain liquid, profitable, and well-capitalized.
While the industry’s measure of solvency, the Capital Adequacy Ratio, has remained well above the revised regulatory 13 percent prudential limit, the BoG notes that asset quality, however, declined marginally.
The 2-day training workshop which is dubbed, “Accurate reportage, the key to financial stability”, is organized by Journalists for Business Advocacy (JBA). Drown from various Media Organizations, about 25 Journalists are undergoing the training which spans from Thursday, April 28th, 2022 to Friday, April 29th, 2022, in Accra.
Mr. Abradu-Otoo, however, urged the media to give accurate reportage on financial issues, adding that there’s a distinction between accurate reportage that comes from publicly available data and accurate reportage from non-publicly available information.
– BY Daniel Bampoe