2023 Budget: Government to restore debt sustainability by ramping up revenue - Ofori-Atta

Government through the Ministry of Finance has announced a plan to urgently mobilise domestic resources in a bid to restore debt sustainability, and macro-economic stability and grow the economy.

Ken Ofori-Atta speaking on the floor of parliament on November 24, 2022 said it has become more critical to mobilise domestic revenue, especially in times like this where the country’s access to the international capital market was largely closed.

“Mr Speaker, post-COVID, we identified the need to ramp-up our domestic revenue mobilisation efforts to match the performance of our peers and finance our development agenda. Last year, we started with the E-Levy which has not yielded the resources as expected,” he stated.

He further said government would introduce additional measures aimed at increasing the country’s revenue to GDP from the current 13 percent to 18 percent in 2023.

This, he explained is expected to see the country mobilise an amount of GH¢143,95 billion as revenues in the year under review.

The measures include an increase of the Value Added Tax (VAT) rate by 2.5 percent which is expected to yield GH¢2.7 billion which would be used to augment funding for road infrastructure development.

Mr Ofori-Atta said this would be complemented by a major compliance programme to ensure that the country derives the maximum yields from existing revenue handles.

He said the government also intends to fast-track the implementation of the Unified Property Rate Platform programme in 2023; and also review the E-Levy Act and more specifically, reduce the headline rate from 1.5 percent to one percent (1%) of the transaction value as well as the removal of the daily threshold.

Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Atta however said the goal of government was to significantly enhance revenues, significantly cut down the cost of running government, significantly expand local production, invest more to protect the poor and vulnerable, and continue expanding access to good roads, education and health for every Ghanaian everywhere in Ghana and the diaspora.