Thinking the unthinkable to rescue Mother Ghana from the doldrums

We must think the unthinkable, if we want to rescue Mother Ghana from the doldrums, by stepping out of the shadow of conventional economic thinking, which limits our horizons no end.


Asked what stepping out of the shadow of conventional economic thinking, in practical terms, involves, I opined to a dear old friend that essentially, it means executing the steps needed to facilitate the transformation of Ghana into a prosperous and equitable society, underpinned by a system, which benefits all its populace's demographics.


As a wise and aspirational African people, whose national economy has tanked, and who face collective-ruination, we must think the impossible, oooo, Ghanafuor - if we are to pull ourselves out of the slippery-walled hole, we have ended up in: thanks to the unparalleled greed driving the state-capture rent-seeking crowd (whose greed is unparalleled in our post-independence history), who now dominate our byzantine system. 


What does thinking the unthinkable entail, dear critical-reader? It entails envisioning an African nation-state determined to profit handsomely from the myriad opportunities available to it, by the creation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCTA) market, fork9 example.


What is the significance of the AfCFTA? To quote the World Bank:"The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement will create the largest free trade area in the world measured by the number of countries participating. The pact connects 1.3 billion people across 55 countries with a 11combined gross domestic product (GDP) valued at US$3.4 TRILLIONS1. It has the potential to lift 30 million people out of extreme poverty, but achieving its full potential will depend on putting in place significant policy reforms and trade facilitation measures."


Thinking the unthinkable to enable us benefit fully from the AfCFTA, means ditching conventional economic thinking and adopting creative sure-fire policies to grow our national economy rapidly.


Why, for example, do we not make Ghana a paradise for both entrepreneurs and workers, by encouraging them to collaborate to ensure the success of all commercial undertakings in Ghana? Will that not make our private sector companies super-competitive? Will that not turn our manufacturing sector into an AfCFTA manufacturing  hub for many products?


To achieve that desirable end, we should have the courage to ban investors who use shell companies, registered in tax havens, such as Mauritius and Luxembourg - which, when targeting Global South markets, are invariably established for the sole purpose of ripping off emerging nations, if truth be told. Nothing good can flow from such investments, as far as mobilising funds for the development of nations in Africa is concerned.


Thinking the unthinkable, also entails, for example, removing the burden of funding the expansion and modernisation of critical infrastructure required to grow our national economy, from the state completely - and in so doing, create opportunities for the private-sector (in partnerships between local and foreign investors), examples being private companies self-financing the building of high-speed railway networks, and tolled six-lane dualised concrete motorways, from Accra, to all the regional capitals, which they will own, operate and maintain for 35 years, before transferring them to the state: transferring their profits overseas 100 percent during that period.


Pension funds and insurance companies in Ghana can provide longterm low interest capital for such projects. 


Thinking the unthinkable, also entails designing initiatives that make regular assured tax-revenues available to governments-of-day.


Building new green climate resilient housing for slum-dwellers in new purpose built green communities, for example, will make it possible to raze down slums across Ghana, and facilitate the building of new world-class high-end mixed commercial and residential developments, in areas where hitherto  slums existed, nationwide.


The aforementioned policy, will be made possible, by the provision of 100-year generational levelling-up funds, for individuals and families, that apply for them, to underpin the building of new green family homes for slum dwellers, in new planned green climate-resilient communities across the landmass of the Republic of Ghana - with repayments from such loans providing revenues for pension funds and insurance companies that provide them, as well as taxes for governments-of-the-day.


Finally, to transform rural Ghana into an area of prosperity, we must encourage the brightest and best entrepreneurs in our country to invest in the agricultural sector, and ensure food security, by thinking the unthinkable - making the whole of our national economy's agricultural sector, not just the cocoa industry, tax free.


That can be done by replicating the brilliant Western Regional organic agripreneur, Issa Ouedraogo's unique profit-sharing climate smart organic farming model, which uses agroforestry principles, to empower its value-chain's oil palm smallholder farmer-stakeholders to bootstrap their way out of poverty to financial independence, for all our key crops, nationwide. These are just a few examples of thinking the unthinkable, if we want to rescue Mother Ghana from the doldrums.