ACCRA, April 22 (Xinhua) -- The Russia-Ukraine conflict has deepened Ghana's macroeconomic imbalances in the short term, threatening its growth in the medium term, said a Ghanaian expert on Friday.
Lesley Dwight Mensah, a research fellow at the Institute of Fiscal Studies, a local economic think tank, told Xinhua that the increasing cost of crude oil in the global market imposed by the conflict had negative consequences on the country's foreign exchange reserves due to the increasing need for foreign exchange for oil and other commodity imports.
The West African country's situation mimicked that of the global economy which was experiencing a difficult recovery from COVID-19, he added.
"Ghana's economy was in a similar position, recovering slowly from the pandemic, and also facing extreme financial difficulties which began to reflect in macroeconomic imbalances," said the analyst.
On April 13, the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) announced that inflation had increased to 19.4 percent in March, the highest rate since August 2009.
Edward Asuo Afram, the head of economic statistics at the GSS, attributed the higher inflation partly to the Russia-Ukraine conflict. ■