By Toma Imirhe
Data released by the Bank of Ghana last week reveals that the country’s merchandise trade surplus for the first two months of 2026 was US$3,689.7 million (equivalent to 3.0% of Gross Domestic Product) which was up by 72.54% on the US$2,136.7 million (1.9% of GDP) made during the corresponding two months of 2025.
But while the primary cause of this surge in the trade surplus was a 32.5% increase in total export earnings, fuelled by a nearly doubling of foreign exchange income from gold sales during the first two months of this year, an equally important, yet largely unacknowledged factor was an unusual marginal drop in the import bill. In January and February 2026, Ghana’s total import bill was US$2,516.3 million, down 1.2% from the US$2,548.3 million incurred during the corresponding period of 2025.
This was very unusual. Ghana’s import bill tends to rise by the year – with the notable exception of 2023 when the steep depreciation of the cedi amid huge foreign exchange shortages forced a fall in imports – and in 2026, the cedi’s major appreciation and a significant fall in commercial bank lending rates generated fears of a surge in imports by traders armed with cheaper credit to buy cheaper foreign exchange.
However the reverse happened and even though, during the first two months of this year, oil imports increased slightly to US$852.7 million, up from US$823.7 million in 2025, non-oil imports contracted significantly to US$1,663.6 million, down 3.5% from US$1,724.6 million during the corresponding two months of last year. More surprisingly, this was achieved at a time that economic growth remains strong. GDP growth for 2025 was an impressive 6% and although growth figures for the start of 2026 have not been made available, early data on economic activity levels emanating from the central bank suggests that this was carried over into 2026.
Analysts are suggesting that the stemming of the merchandise import bill at a time of strong economic growth indicates significant successes in import substitution with regards to finished goods, intermediate production inputs or both. This gives hope that Ghana may finally be reducing its inordinate import dependency, a requisite for direly needed increased job creation.
Although the slight reduction in the import bill took many economists by surprise, the sharp increase in export revenues was easily the bigger factor driving the substantial expansion of the merchandise trade surplus.
Yet despite the overall increase in export earnings, its structure gives cause for concern; while gold export revenue increased significantly during the first two months of this year, as compared with the corresponding period of 2025, all the other export categories cocoa, oil and non-traditional exports all saw their revenues decline, indicating an increasing, and already inordinate, reliance on gold revenues.
Gold revenues for the first two months of 2026, at US$4,257.4 million were 84.1% higher than 2025’s US$2,312.8 million. However cocoa’s export revenues declined from US$1194.7 million to US$956.3 million; oil’s revenues fell from US$581.3 million to US$451.5 million; and non-traditional exports shrank from US$596.2 million to US$451.5 million.
This means that for the first two months of 2026, gold exports accounted for 68.6% of Ghana’s total export revenues, up from 49.4% during the corresponding year of 2025, creating the spectre of the country moving towards becoming a mono-product exporter.
