Key Highlights Of Ghana's 2025 Budget Statement & Economic Policy

The Minister stated that the fiscal policy objectives of government which aims to support the economic transformation agenda to ensure the macroeconomic stability of the country within the macroeconomic and fiscal framework include:

• Rationalizing government expenditure and eliminating wasteful expenditure
• Optimizing domestic revenue mobilization through the broadening of the tax base, increased non-tax revenue collection, adopting enhanced tax compliance measures, and modernization of tax administration through digital technology
• Increasing the share of domestic capital expenditure to spur economic growth and job creation
• Reducing public debt to sustainable levels and adopting prudent debt management practices to support debt sustainability
• Reducing the fiscal deficit progressively in accordance with an amended Fiscal Responsibility Act to promote fiscal and debt sustainability
• Restoring confidence in Ghana’s economy

Key Initiative (Revenue Measures) for 2025
To achieve the above fiscal objectives of the Government, the following revenue measures were proposed for the consideration and approval of Parliament. The Minister also stated that these revenue measures are consistent with governments commitment under the IMF -supported program to observe a non-oil tax revenue effort of 0.6 percentage points annually.

• A complete overhaul of the current tax system. As part of this, the following taxes termed nuisance taxes are to be abolished;
  
  

• 10% withholding tax (WHT) on winnings from lottery

• Electronic Transfer Levy (E-levy) of 1%

• Emission Levy on industries and vehicles

• VAT on motor insurance policy and

• 1.5% withholding tax (WHT) on winning of unprocessed gold by small-scale miners.

• Review of all the taxes, fees and charges at the Ports

• The 2025 minimum wage will be zero-rated

• Strengthening of the Modified Taxation System. This will include the rolling out of a digitized system to capture details of eligible taxpayers, submission of returns and dedicated USSD code for payment of taxes.

• Extension of the waiver of penalty and interest under the Voluntary Disclosure Programme (VDP) to cover persons with foreign undeclared accounts, persons with accumulated arrears, and persons with outstanding returns

• Elimination of VAT exemption on Non-Life Insurance excluding motor policy.

• Review of the Energy Sector Levy Act (ESLA) to consolidate the Energy Debt Recovery Levy, Energy Sector Recovery Levy (Delta Fund), and Sanitation & Pollution Levy into one levy.

• Reduction of the current tax refund rate of six percentage points by two percentage points to four percentage points to cover for the revenue gap from the abolishment of the various taxes.

• An increase in the Growth and Sustainability Levy from one percentage point on the gross production of mining companies to three percentage points and also extend the sunset close of the levy from 2025 to 2028.

• An extension of the sunset clause of the Special Import Levy to 2028.

• A re-introduction of the road toll in 2025 which has been zero-rated since 2022.

• Embark on an aggressive and sustained tax education in the next 2-3 years to ensure improved tax compliance and tax revenue mobilization among the informal sectors.

• Reform of the current Value Added Tax (VAT) regime. This will include.

• Abolishing the Covid-19 levy

• Reversing the decoupling of GET Fund and NHIL from the VAT

• Reducing the effective VAT rate for households and businesses

  
  

• Reversing the VAT flat rate regime

• Upwardly adjusting the VAT registration threshold to exempt micro and small businesses from the collection of VAT and

• Improving compliance through public education and awareness.