The processes required to start a business in Ghana are difficult compared to other countries and government has not done much to intervene, a Doing Business 2017 report has observed.
Team leader of ‘The Doing Business Technical Team’, Mr Friedric Meunier said, “Ghana performed poorly on the ‘Starting A Business’ and ‘Dealing with Construction Permit’ indicators because, respectively, fees for obtaining licences and permits were increased.”
Mr Meunier said the country scored poorly because “Ghana made starting a business more costly by increasing registration and authentication fees”.
Further, the number of days to register a business was 14, which was still far from best practice and it took an even longer time to get the business licensed. Together, these make doing business in Ghana more difficult.
A representative from the Registrar General’s Department said that improvements had been made in the process of registering a business. Particularly, it was now possible to register businesses online. However, the system was not currently in use because of issues with the online payment system which was being sorted out. This will likely translate into a better score on the ‘Starting a Business’ indicator in the next report.
The International Finance Corporation, in conjunction with the Ghana National Chamber of Commerce, organised the event. They were supported by IMANI Ghana.
Ghana ranked best in the ‘Getting Credit’ indicator, placing 44th out of 190 countries.
Source: AccraFM
