Undervaluation of gold exports makes Ghana lose over US$2 billion in taxes – Research

Gold and Cocoa are key export commodities for Ghana

Ghana’s gold output jumped by 12% in 2018 to 4.8 million ounces, Report

Ghana is the leading producer of gold in Africa

Ghana is reported to have been losing more than US$2 billion in taxes due to the undervaluation of gold exports.

This was according to research conducted by a consortium including the Institute for Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) and its partners.

Senior Economic Researcher at ISSER, Dr. Ama Ahene-Cudjoe, presenting findings from the research said the study identified that Ghana’s exports were undervalued by an estimated US$8.3 billion between 2011 and 2017.

“We estimated that gold was abnormally undervalued at about US$8.3 billion at constant prices and the base year is 2011. Our study was between 2011 and 2017. And in current prices, this is about US$3.8 billion and this constitutes approximately 11% of the total value of gold exported during this period.”

“The top five destination countries of these undervalued gold exports include major gold refining destinations, India, South Africa, United Arab Emirates, Switzerland and Portugal. This represented major gold refining, trading and manufacturing destinations”.

Dr. Ama Ahene-Cudjoe who is a member of the research team made this known on January 25, 2022.

She however pointed out that the study implored a rather novel measure used to derive data from the Ghana Revenue Authority and other relevant government agencies spanning through three political administrations.

The consortium of researchers said their study focused primarily on cocoa and gold exports as the two commodities were key exports resources for Ghana.

Meanwhile, the study was conducted by ISSER and its partners including the Graduate Institute of Geneva.

GIG’s research project focused on Curbing Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) which was funded by the Swiss Programme for Research on Global Issues for Development.