Former Finance Minister Seth Terkper believes that every currency on the globe will have the same purchasing power and the underlying rate of inflation as the $, €, ¥ , not even those of emerging economies if all countries print their own money.
His comment comes on the heels of a proposal made by the Director of Research at the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), Dr John Kwakye, to countries that are not printing their own money to start doing so.
In the view of Dr Kwakye, if countries can print their own money to address their economic problems, then there will be no poor country in the world.
“Why don’t we print more money and make every Ghanaian a Cedi millionaire? That should eliminate poverty in Ghana, shouldn’t it?” he tweeted.
Mr Terkper commented on this, indicating that “Further, every currency on the globe will have the same purchasing power and the underlying rate of inflation as the $, €, ¥ etc, not even those of emerging [EM] economies.”
According to a report by DW, only a handful of African countries, like Nigeria, Morocco, and Kenya have enough resources to print their own currencies or mint their own coins.
At least 40 African countries print their money in the UK, France and Germany — decades after independence, raising questions about self-sufficiency, the report added.
In the case of Ghana, a retired Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG), Mr Emmanuel Asiedu-Mante said the cedi is printed by De La Rue, a security printing firm based in the United Kingdom.
“We have done with firms in Germany and France too; these are security printers and the cost is a huge one. They print and charge in British pounds,” he told the state-owned Daily Graphic in an earlier interview.
“This, he said explained why BoG undertakes occasional public education exercises on how to handle the notes well to reduce the spate of destruction and printing to replace.
“It is because each banknote costs a lot of money. Think of it; the paper, the security features and the ink. A lot goes into it,” he added.