Summary

Ghana remains a champion of democracy in Africa, with power having regularly changed hands democratically since 1992. In development terms, its record of achieving certain Millennium Development Goals by 2015 is impressive. In the period ahead, it is set to become Africa's fastest-growing economy in 2018.

But there is another side to the coin. Inequality is higher than it has ever been in Ghana, while almost 1 person in 4 lives in poverty and 1 in 12 lives in extreme poverty. Spending on social protection is very low by the standards of comparable African countries and remarkably little is spent on social assistance. Ghana has a number of admirable social programmes, but few convincing plans for funding many of them adequately. As a result, a large number of Ghanaians do not enjoy their basic economic and social human rights.