Thinking about Financialization and Industrialization in Ghana: Is there Evidence of Long-run Equilibrium?

Abstract

Ghana recently decided to embark on a massive industrialization agenda, because the decision makers in the country believe that industrialization is the way to create sustainable employment and achieve sustained long run economic growth. However, there are threats to this agenda that need to be examined. In this paper, we show that financing industrialization via typical domestic sources or foreign aid do not support the growth of manufacturing in Ghana. We argue that financialization threatens the success of industrialization in Ghana, because typical domestic finance and foreign aid focus on short-term returns. Using time series data from 1980 - 2019, we model the relationship between domestic finance, foreign aid and manufacturing growth in Ghana. The results support our concerns about threats of financialization. We recommend that Ghanaian policy makers consider using industrial finance as was done in Japan in the 1950s and 1960s to achieve long-term sustainability for industrialization in Ghana instead of using typical market-based credit or debt.