Half of Ghanaian households had to reduce food consumption due to covid-19

We continue to highlight the impact of the covid-19 pandemic in our series based on findings from the Ghana Statistical Service covid-19 household and jobs tracker survey.

Mobile money account ownership in Ghana

There has been a substantial increase in the amount of funds in mobile money accounts in Ghana between June last year and June this year. The increase in funds was from GH¢3 billion to GH¢4.5 billion while the number of active mobile money accounts increased from 12.9 million to 15.5 million. These changes have been attributed to the effect of the covid-19 pandemic.

We posted findings earlier from the covid-19 business tracker that showed businesses reporting using more digital technology in their businesses use.

The increase in the use of digital payments such as mobile money has us wondering about financial inclusion and the proportion of the population that has access to mobile money.

About 3 out of 10 Ghanaian children have not engaged in any learning activities since March

We discussed the implications of school closures on educational inequality in Ghana as not all children would be able to participate in virtual learning programmes because they did not have access to radio, TV, and/or internet.

The Ghana Statistical Service report from the first wave of their household and jobs survey confirms that a substantial proportion of children have not been able to engage in virtual learning since March.

3 out of 4 Ghanaian children who missed vaccinations did so due to covid-related reasons

During World Immunization Week 2020, the WHO called for actions to minimize disruptions to immunization programmes due to the covid-19 pandemic.

The Households and Jobs Tracker survey has confirmed that the pandemic has increased the risk of children who are due for vaccinations not getting the needed vaccine. The report indicated that 76.8% of children did not get vaccinated when they had to because of covid-19 related reasons.