Godfred Alufar Bokpin, an Economics Professor at the University of Ghana has said the Ghana Gold Board (GoldBod) should not be credited for Ghana’s recent macroeconomic stability.
According to him, even though GoldBod has helped bring gold-related foreign exchange into the formal economy, the gains in macroeconomic stability are due to fiscal and monetary policy engineered by the Bank of Ghana (BoG).
He has, however, credited GoldBod for reducing gold smuggling and increasing FX retention in the country. According to him, the GoldBod arrangement has brought in FX that may have been lost to smuggling.
“You can see that the gap has narrowed significantly with the introduction of Gold Board. And I think that is a credit to Gold Board,” he said.
Prof. Bokpin, has however, highlighted the significant cost associated with the programme. “This whole domestic gold purchase arrangement for which Gold Board essentially became the face of it from 2025 has also come at a significant loss to us, has come at a significant loss,” he said.
He asserts the programme had design defects that could have been avoided with better planning. “They were design defects of the program,” he said in an interview with JoyNews on Tuesday, August 18, 2026.
Prof. Bokpin said macroeconomic stability is not GoldBod’s job. “In fact, that is not the job of the Gold Board. Macroeconomic stability comes from essentially fiscal and monetary policy, which is the Bank of Ghana and all of that,” he added.
He further noted that GoldBod’s benefit must be weighed against the cost of running the programme, citing the losses from the domestic gold purchase programme which he said puts the Board’s losses above the $1.7 billion being discussed.
“Now, we are talking about 22 billion Ghana cedis or 1.7 billion Ghana cedis. In fact, let me put this across, that if you adopt a holistic approach and look at the whole intervention we put in place, the losses actually exceed the $1.7 billion we are talking about here,” he added.
He also cited the abolition of the 1.5% withholding tax on ASM gold as a cost to the state, saying the fiscal impact is significant given that ASM gold exports are over $10 billion.
“So, you have all these losses sitting on the books of the Bank of Ghana. Is that okay? In addition to that, we had to abolish the 1.5%. If you look at the total gold exports from artisanal small-scale miners, which are more than $10 billion, is that okay? And you want to do the analysis in terms of the fiscal losses, which could have gone to our revenue envelope, probably to fund roads, schools, and infrastructure, we have to give up that one also,” he explained.
Prof. Bokpin, however, acknowledged the progress GoldBod made amid the concerns. “I recognise the impact of Gold Board, and I celebrate the progress that they have made in terms of crowding in gold-related FX,” he said.
His reactions follow the Minority’s call on the GoldBod to explain to Ghanaians, how it incurred those losses in gold purchases.
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