ACCRA, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- The greatest challenge remaining in Ghana's economic management is the low tax compliance, Minister of Finance Kenneth Ofori-Atta disclosed here on Monday.
Addressing the media on government's macro-fiscal performance since it came to power in January 2017 , the minister noted that the government's ability to provide essential services was hampered by tax evasion.
He observed that people were evading taxes, a situation which led to the government's inability to provide the essential social services.
The country's Revenue-to-Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ratio hovers around 15 percent.
However, the finance minister said the government's investment in infrastructure and support for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) among others will be the driving factors for non-oil growth.
"We did project a 6.6 percent GDP growth and we have gone beyond that. And the numbers suggest that for all the key macro figures we did better than what was expected. It does take a while for policies to trickle through," the minister added.
The provisional figures from the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) puts GDP growth in the third quarter of 2017 at 9.3 percent after growing 6.6 percent in the first quarter and 9.0 percent in the second quarter.
Samuel Danquah Arkhurst, Chief Economics Officer and Director of Debt Management Division, said the government's fiscal consolidation measures had resulted in the reduction in inflation from 15.5 percent in December 2016 to 11.8 percent in December 2017 and 10.3 percent in January 2018.
Arkhurst also said that yield curve on government debts was normalizing; fiscal deficit and primary balance were under control as the focus on liability management and reduction in financing costs resulted in investor confidence in the economy.