Parliament passed the Ghana National Reserve Accumulation Programme in February 2026, enshrining in law the gold-backed reserve strategy that has underpinned the country’s currency stabilisation. The legislation locks the Bank of Ghana’s Domestic Gold Purchase Programme into a statutory framework, making the practice resistant to reversal by a future administration that might prefer a different reserve mix.
The mechanism is straightforward but consequential. The Bank of Ghana purchases gold locally from miners in cedi, refines the metal, and exports it to build foreign-exchange reserves. The structure converts domestic mineral production into reserve assets without burning through the country’s hard-currency receipts, and it gives Ghanaian miners a domestic buyer at fair value. The combined effect has been a reserve build that international rating agencies have repeatedly noted as a structural improvement.
For the broader West African region, the Ghana approach is now being studied as a template. Countries with significant domestic gold or other mineral production but limited foreign-reserve depth — a description that fits much of the continent — are watching whether the Ghana model can be replicated without exposing the central bank to commodity-price volatility or to the political pressure that often accompanies state purchases of locally mined gold. The August 2026 IMF programme review will be the next external read on whether the framework is delivering as designed. For diaspora households remitting to Ghana, the stronger cedi is the visible benefit; the durability of the framework is the longer question.
Sources: Bank of Ghana; Ghanamma; KPMG Ghana 2026 Budget Highlights, February–May 2026.