A startling new report by the African Center for Retirement Research (ACRR) has revealed that six out of every ten pensioners in Ghana are living in poverty, with many surviving on as little as GHC300 per month.
Speaking at a conference in Accra on October 22, Abdallah Mashud, Executive Director of the ACRR, painted a troubling picture of the country’s pension system.
“Imagine the case — somebody is receiving GHC300 at the end of the month and someone else is receiving GHC201,000. It’s not only impacting disparities, but also affecting the financial sustainability of the system,” Mashud stated.
The report raises urgent concerns about the sustainability and fairness of Ghana’s pension scheme, particularly the indexation formula used by the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT).
According to the ACRR, current pension adjustments tend to favour high-income pensioners, leaving those at the lower end of the scale with little to no meaningful improvements in their standard of living.
“The minimum pension increased each year from 2000 until 2017,” Mashud explained.
“In 2017, it did not increase. It went up again in 2018 and 2019, from GHC200 to GHC300. But since then, it has been stuck — and this is impacting poverty. It’s happening because there’s a weakness in the pension indexation that we are using.”
While some pensioners take home between GHC186,000 to GHC201,000 monthly, many others, especially those in the informal sector or with limited contribution histories, continue to receive only GHC300 per month — a figure well below Ghana’s current poverty threshold.
“If you take the poverty threshold, you realise that three out of five pensioners are considered poor,” Mashud said. “They struggle to live — they struggle in retirement. We have to review the pension situation in the country.”
To address the issue, the ACRR is calling for a new pension indexation model — one that prioritises more significant increases for low-income pensioners while moderating increments for high earners.
“It is important we review the pension indexation model in Ghana to promote sustainable benefit financing among the pensioner population,” he said.
The Center says it has already begun engaging key stakeholders and policymakers to push for urgent reforms that will ensure equity and dignity for all pensioners in Ghana.
By Daniel Opoku
