The Bank of Ghana is urging the development of an agricultural and agribusiness sector that is robust and flourishing.
Elsie Addo Awadzi, the second deputy governor, asserts that agriculture has larger economic effects, including price stability, exchange rate stability, and the development of export income.
Speaking at the launch of an agriculture advocacy platform, Mrs. Addo Awadzi warned that failing to address the issue of food supply might eventually jeopardise the Central Bank's objective of price stability.
The inflation figures have shown a steady rise in food costs since May 2021; this tendency has accelerated recently as a result of the ongoing conflicts in Russia and Ukraine. From 5.4 percent in May 2021 to 30.1 percent in May 2022, there was a huge increase in the price of food.
Further analysis of the statistics, according to the Bank of Ghana's Second Deputy Governor, shows that food inflation is accelerating more quickly than non-food inflation.
Therefore, she explained, the Central Bank's goal of price stability may ultimately be compromised if issues with the food supply are not addressed.
Because of this, she noted, "the Bank of Ghana played a key role in the conception, design, and implementation of the Ghana Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (GIRSAL) and continues to assist the scheme in a number of ways.
GIRSAL was created as a comprehensive and integrated system of tools to derisk the agricultural industry and encourage banks to lend to it to spur the growth of agribusiness.
and ease financial restrictions that hinder competition.
BoG initially gave GIRSAL 200 million in startup money and 10 million for setup and operating costs. However, BoG continues to support the project in a number of ways after transferring its ownership interest in GIRSAL Limited to the government (Ministry of Finance) in June 2018.
These include the approval of a zero-risk weighting of credit exposures covered by the GIRSAL Credit Guarantee Scheme, which shows the trust the central bank places in the CRG scheme and enhances its legitimacy and appeal to financial institutions.
She said, "In fact, BoG is a crucial partner to GIRSAL and looks forward to supporting its initiatives, including today's inauguration of an Agribusiness Public-Private Partnership Platform.
"In fact, BoG is a crucial partner to GIRSAL and eagerly anticipates supporting its initiatives, such as the opening of an Agribusiness Public-Private Partnership Platform today. In order to harness the full potential of this sector, stakeholders should be able to identify significant bottlenecks in the agricultural and agribusiness value chain using the newly established AG Platform, she continued.
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