Parliament has approved a US$200million loan agreement between government and the World Bank to finance the Ghana Digital Acceleration Project.
The project is expected to increase access to mobile Internet and broadband services for 6 million people by encouraging private sector investment in last-mile connectivity of underserved rural areas.
It is further expected to promote digital inclusion for women, persons with disabilities and rural communities through regulatory updates and investments among others; thus helping remove barriers to broadband and digital service access for Ghana’s lowest-income people, and to close the regional digital gap.
Addressing parliamentarians following approval of the loan on Tuesday, May 2, 2023, Communications and Digitalisation Minister, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, said the project will strengthen the local digital entrepreneurship ecosystem.
She said the potential for digital transformation is significant, as is reflected in the rise of foreign direct investments; hence the need to support this project which will help the establishment of robust digital infrastructure across the length and breadth of the country.
“Without providing support to our start-ups through the Venture Capital Trust Fund and other existing institutions, without promoting gender digital inclusion, without ensuring that our persons with disabilities also acquire the relevant digital skills that we need, it will be difficult for Ghana to perform its role in the comity of nations and also empower people to take advantage of the opportunities that are being created by the digital revolution,” Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful stated.
The digital ecosystem is one of the best-performing sectors in the country, growing on average by 19 percent annually between 2014 and 2020, said the World Bank. Currently, Ghana is among the digital leaders in sub-Saharan Africa, and the Digital Economy diagnostic conducted in 2020 identified key bottlenecks that need to be removed to further accelerate Ghana’s digital transformation, the World Bank stated.
The Ghana Digital Acceleration Project will therefore build on previous investments, particularly through the ongoing World Bank-supported e-Transform Ghana project, by supporting a regulatory shift to create an enabling environment for digital inclusion and innovation; streamline governance and delivery of public services; and facilitate smallholder engagement in data-driven digital agriculture.
Commenting on the project last year, Pierre Laporte – World Bank Country Director for Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone – said expanding digital access and adoption, enhancing digital public service delivery, and promoting digitally-enabled innovation are essential for Ghana’s digital transformation, which will help drive a robust post-COVID-19 recovery.
“The Ghana Digital Acceleration Project covers all these elements and will help advance the whole-of-government digital transformation agenda to accelerate adoption of digital technologies and innovation by key productive sectors, such as agriculture, to foster an economy-wide digital transformation,” he said at the time.
