 | This article needs to be updated.(October 2020) |
The Ghanaian salt industry as of 2009 produced between 250,000 and 300,000 tonnes of salt annually. The Ghana Export Promotion Authority (GEPA) has identified the sector as an important one to aid the diversification of Ghana's economy, and the Ghanaian government is currently within the process of developing the industry. [1]
Ghana has the production potential of 2.2 million tonnes of salt annually. Economists in Ghana believe the nation's salt industry represents a potential source of revenue from Nigerian purchasers who currently rely on Brazilian imports. [1]
The GEPC has requested that the Commonwealth Secretariat establish a framework in Ghana to coordinate the development of the salt sector in the country. As a result, a team of consultants has conducted many interviews and seminars and undertaken market analysis with a realistic strategy and targets. [1] While developers realise that Ghana will never be a leading world producer, the proponents believe that the development of the salt industry in Ghana will be important to the economy and the overall economic development of western Africa in supply. [1] The salt can also be used to make chemical products which historically western Africa has not been capable of making. In 2002, the Minister of Mines, Kwadwo Adjei-Darko spoke at a salt mining site in Mendskrom, near the Weija Barrier, about increasing production in Ghana:
"Besides, it is equally important that we add value to the salt and think of converting it into other chemical products to enable us meet international competitors like Brazil and Australia who have dominated the West African market. Our capacity is low, sometimes let us involve partnership, which would be of interest to the nation. If we developed the salt industry through the private sector, it could become a major exporting commodity that would bring in more foreign exchange for Ghana, which may even superseded what Nigeria is earning in oil today." [2]
In Ghana, as in many countries, the most common method of salt extraction, being the most cost-effective and productive, is solar evaporation, using brine from the sea, marine lagoons or underground wells or boreholes. One of Ghana's signature salt industrialists, Crown Sea Salt Limited, uses solar evaporation of seawater and is currently developing and testing new technologies to reduce production cost and improve on consistent product quality. [3] Pambros Salt Production Limited, the largest salt producer in western Africa (producing 350,000 tonnes of salt in Ghana and Senegal in 2002) have aspirations to capitalize on government support and investment in increasing production to capacity. [2]
The economy of Eritrea has undergone extreme changes after the War of Independence. It experienced considerable growth in recent years, indicated by an improvement in gross domestic product in 2011 of 8.7 percent and in 2012 of 7.5% over 2011, and has a total of $8.090 billion as of 2020. However, worker remittances from abroad are estimated to account for 32 percent of gross domestic product.
The economy of Ghana has a diverse and rich resource base, including the manufacturing and exportation of digital technology goods, automotive and ship construction and exportation, and the exportation of diverse and rich resources such as hydrocarbons and industrial minerals.
The economy of Mali is based to a large extent upon agriculture, with a mostly rural population engaged in subsistence agriculture.
The gross domestic product (GDP) of Niger was $16.617 billion US dollars in 2023, according to official data from the World Bank. This data is based largely on internal markets, subsistence agriculture, and the export of raw commodities: foodstuffs to neighbors and raw minerals to world markets. Niger, a landlocked West African nation that straddles the Sahel, has consistently been ranked on the bottom of the Human Development Index, at 0.394 as of 2019. It has a very low per capita income, and ranks among the least developed and most heavily indebted countries in the world, despite having large raw commodities and a relatively stable government and society not currently affected by civil war or terrorism. Economic activity centers on subsistence agriculture, animal husbandry, re-export trade, and export of uranium.
The economy of Nigeria is a middle-income, mixed economy and emerging market with expanding manufacturing, financial, service, communications, technology, and entertainment sectors. It is ranked as the 53rd-largest economy in the world in terms of nominal GDP, the fourth largest in Africa and the 27th-largest in terms of purchasing power parity.
Potash includes various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water-soluble form. The name derives from pot ash, plant ashes or wood ash soaked in water in a pot, the primary means of manufacturing potash before the Industrial Era. The word potassium is derived from potash.
Import substitution industrialization (ISI) is a trade and economic policy that advocates replacing foreign imports with domestic production. It is based on the premise that a country should attempt to reduce its foreign dependency through the local production of industrialized products. The term primarily refers to 20th-century development economics policies, but it has been advocated since the 18th century by economists such as Friedrich List and Alexander Hamilton.
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Mining in Western Australia, together with the petroleum industry in the state, accounted for 94% of the State's and 46% of Australia's income from total merchandise exports in 2019–20. The state of Western Australia hosted 123 predominantly higher-value and export-oriented mining projects and hundreds of smaller quarries and mines. The principal projects produced more than 99 per cent of the industry's total sales value.
Augustus "Goosie" Obuadum Tanoh is a Ghanaian politician and businessman. He was the leader of the National Reform Party, a breakaway group from the National Democratic Congress between 1999 and 2007 and represented this party in the 2000 presidential election, where he garnered 1.1% of the national vote. He returned to the National Democratic Congress with his colleagues from the National Reform Party at the behest and upon appeals made by President John Atta Mills in 2007/2008. Tanoh is originally a founding member of the National Democratic Congress.
Agriculture in Ghana consists of a variety of agricultural products and is an established economic sector, providing employment on a formal and informal basis. It is represented by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture. Ghana produces a variety of crops in various climatic zones which range from dry savanna to wet forest which run in east–west bands across Ghana. Agricultural crops, including yams, grains, cocoa, oil palms, kola nuts, and timber, form the base of agriculture in Ghana's economy. In 2013 agriculture employed 53.6% of the total labor force in Ghana.
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Ghana generates electric power from hydropower, fossil-fuel, and renewable energy sources such as wind and solar energy. Electricity generation is one of the key factors in order to achieve the development of the Ghanaian national economy, with aggressive and rapid industrialization; Ghana's national electric energy consumption was 265 kilowatt hours per each one in 2009.
Benin is predominantly a rural society, and agriculture in Benin supports more than 70% of the population. Agriculture contributes around 35% of the country's gross domestic product (GDP) and 80% of export income. While the Government of Benin (GOB) aims to diversify its agricultural production, Benin remains underdeveloped, and its economy is underpinned by subsistence agriculture. Approximately 93% of total agricultural production goes into food production. The proportion of the population living in poverty is about 35.2%, with more rural households in poverty (38.4%) than urban households (29.8%). 36% of households depend solely upon agricultural (crop) production for income, and another 30% depend on crop production, livestock, or fishing for income.
The economy of Ivory Coast is stable and currently growing, in the aftermath of political instability in recent decades. The Ivory Coast's economy is largely market-based and depends heavily on the agricultural sector. Almost 70% of the Ivorian people are engaged in some form of agricultural activity. The economy grew 82% in the 1960s, reaching a peak growth of 360% in the 1970s, but this proved unsustainable and it shrank by 28% in the 1980s and a further 22% in the 1990s. This decline, coupled with high population growth, resulted in a steady fall in living standards. The Gross national product per capita, now rising again, was about US$727 in 1996. It was substantially higher two decades before. Real GDP growth is expected to average 6.5% in 2024–25.
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Climate change in Ghana is impacting the people in Ghana in several ways as the country sits at the intersection of three hydro-climatic zones. Changes in rainfall, weather conditions and sea-level rise will affect the salinity of coastal waters. This is expected to negatively affect both farming and fisheries. Low precipitation, drought and wild fires are also some major effects associated with climate change in Ghana.
The economic history of Ghana details the economic development and the current economic situation of Ghana since pre-colonial times to date.
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