Ghana requires private-public partnerships to achieve access to high-speed internet—Ursula Owusu

Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, Communications and Digitalization Minister has disclosed that only 30 percent of Ghana’s population can access high-speed internet.

She said financing is a significant obstacle to expanding high-speed internet coverage across the nation.

She highlighted that, despite the West African nation using a 4G infrastructure, little has changed in the last eight years.

Speaking during the IMF and World Bank 2023 annual meetings in Marrakech, Morocco, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful noted that infrastructure projects should be implemented to make high-speed internet more accessible.

“One of the biggest challenges we are faced with is funding, [and] financing the big infrastructural projects.

“If you look at the fact that since we set up eight years ago to build the 4G network in our country, we only have 30% of our population having access to high-speed broadband. We still have a very long way to go,” Ursula Owusu stated.

Given that digitization is a key factor in growing the economy, she underlined the necessity of addressing the problem in order to improve life for Ghanaians.

She added that government is exploring public-private partnerships as a way to increase funding for the creation of digital infrastructure.

“As our economies are struggling and getting increasingly saddled with the international capital market, we are finding other ways of financing our infrastructure development and looking at public-private partnership initiatives,” she stated.

She highlighted the establishment of the Cyber Security Authority, the creation of a cyber security committee, and the licencing of cyber security experts as measures to safeguard digital infrastructure.

“Another key area that is of utmost concern to us is cyber security,” Owusu-Ekuful said. “We cannot rollout digital infrastructure without securing our data and so much riding on it. Every sector is digitally connected.”

Axel Van Trotsenberg, senior managing director, development policy and partnership at the World Bank, who was also on the panel, said the World Bank is committed to scaling up the financing of digital infrastructure in developing countries, including Ghana, by making US$70 billion accessible for digital developments.