Deputy Minister of Finance, Abena Osei Asare has charged the newly-inaugurated National Steering Committee of the 2023 Ghana Integrated Business Establishment Survey, IBES to ensure the timely release of its report.
The Committee has been given a December 5 deadline to meet and release its report.
The 2023 IBES is a survey that aims to cover formal and informal businesses including those without permanent locations like online and virtual businesses in Ghana.
It will be the first time the survey will be extended to cover those areas.
She mentioned that the report will bring about policy interventions to help businesses.
” Most of the time, more emphasis is laid on the formal sector, and a lot is happening in the informal sector, and I believe that IBES will be in a better position to capture that and see how best we can utilize the information to raise more revenue and to better determine proper outcomes that will also help when it comes to the setting of the target, and the things that we need, and can build to help bring about some good economic development in our nation,”
Madam Abena Osei Asare expressed hope that the committee will not seek an extension of the December 5 deadline and pledged support from her outfit to the committee.
Government Statistician, Professor Samuel Annim explained the importance of the survey and the mandate of the steering committee.
“For the first time the data that we going to collect will give us what we call the business growth poles which essentially tells us the viability of the different businesses we have in Ghana across different geographic areas,” he said.
“Also on the back of the pandemic when a lot of businesses suffered because of the pandemic, the government wanted to support businesses but we didn’t have readily available data so this will also build a live business register,” he added.
