Ghana’s external debt stock for the first quarter of this year declined by 0.47 percentage points.
According to the Q1 2021 Statistical Bulletin released by the Central Bank, the provisional stock of outstanding government and government-guaranteed external debt at end March 2021 was $24.6 billion.
Compared with the recorded external debt level of $24.7 billion as at the end of Q4 2020, the recorded 0.47 percentage points decline in the external debt stock in monetary terms translates into some $116 million.
The recorded decrease in the external debt stock the Bank of Ghana (BoG) notes was mainly due to a decline in multilateral, bilateral, export credit, and other concessional debts.
However, on a year-on-year basis, the end of Q1 2021 external debt stock level indicates an increase of $1.5 billion (6.66%) when compared with the external debt level of $23 billion in Q1 2021.
The external debt stock at end Q1 2021, the Central Bank notes represents 32.5 percent of GDP compared with 32.7 percent recorded in Q1 2020.
External debts by creditor group
Analysis of the external debt stock by creditor category indicates that multilateral debts totalled $8.1 billion at the end of Q1 2021, representing a fall of $157.29 million from the position of $8.2 billion recorded at the end of Q4 2020.
Bilateral component of the total external debt was $1.24 billion representing a share of 5.1 percent of the total external debt stock at the end of Q1 2021, compared with 5.2 percent for the same period in 2020.
This was $51.66 million (4.0%) less than the stock position of $1.29 billion recorded at the end of Q4 2020 and $42.23 (3.51%), above the level of $1.20 billion registered in Q1 2020.
Also, commercial debts at the end of Q1 2021 stood at $2.5 billion and represents 10.5 percent of the total external debt stock.
Debts owed to the International Capital Market on the other hand, stood at $10.2 billion constituting the highest share (41.5%) of the total external debt stock at the end of Q1 2021 compared with 44.4 percent for Q1 2020.
This was $0.36 million above the level of $10.21 billion for Q4 2020 and $15.64 million less than the stock position of $10.23 billion registered at the end of Q1 2020.
Other Concessional debts at the end of March 2021 stood at $1.51 billion and constituted 6.2 percent of the total external debt stock.
This indicates a decline of $29.49 million (1.9%) compared to the previous quarter’s position of US$1.54 billion. From Q1 2020 to Q1 2021, other concessional debts fell by $161.74 million.
