By Leo Nelson
Despite a much-touted increase in the 2025 national budget for education, Ghana is still miles away from meeting global standards.
A damning report by Africa Education Watch (Eduwatch) reveals the nation’s financial commitment to schooling remains woefully inadequate, casting a dark shadow over its ability to hit critical sustainable development goals.
The report, a deep dive into the first budget under President John Dramani Mahama’s administration, pulls no punches. It meticulously dissects the figures, laying bare the stark reality against principles of allocation efficiency and Ghana’s international promises on education funding.
While the government boasts a projected total public expenditure of GHC 270.9 billion in 2025 – a supposed 16.57% jump from last year’s GHC 226 billion – Eduwatch’s analysis tells a different story.
At first glance, the GHC 42.1 billion earmarked for education in 2025 seems impressive – the highest nominal amount ever. It even marks the biggest slice of the national budget dedicated to education in the post-COVID-19 era, signaling a partial recovery in prioritizing the sector.
But don’t let the numbers fool you. Eduwatch’s report paints a grim picture of persistent failures to meet globally recognized funding benchmarks.
Since 2018, education’s share of the national cake has been on a rollercoaster, hitting a high of 4.63% of GDP in 2020 before spiraling downwards. By 2025, this figure is set to plunge to a dismal 3.01% – an eight-year low.
The story is similar for education’s slice of the overall national budget. While it peaked at 20.76% in 2019, it plummeted to a shocking 13.13% in 2023.
Even with a bump to 15.56% in 2025, it’s still nowhere near the recommended global standard of 20% of the national budget.
“The 2025 budgetary allocation to education, therefore, fails to meet both international financing benchmarks (4-6% of GDP or 20% of national budget) and falls short of Sub-Saharan Africa’s average of 4.1 per cent (2023) of GDP to education,” the report unequivocally states.
Perhaps the most damning revelation is the nation’s twisted priorities. In 2025, Ghana will cough up a staggering GHC 64.2 billion on debt servicing – dwarfing the GHC 42.1 billion allocated to education.
This eye-watering disparity, Eduwatch points out, is a direct consequence of Ghana’s massive debt, crippling spending on crucial social sectors.
One of the most pressing concerns highlighted by Eduwatch is the consistent neglect of basic education. Between 2010 and 2015, this foundational level received a measly average of just 46% of the total education expenditure.
For Ghana to truly transform its education system, the report stresses, at least 40% of the total education budget must be consistently channeled into basic education. Currently, Basic, Inclusive and Special Education, and Complementary Education – serving over 6.5 million children – remain critically underfunded.
This stands in stark contrast to Tertiary and Second Cycle Education, which, despite serving roughly 2 million beneficiaries combined, gobble up a disproportionately larger share of the funds.
“For a country with close to one million children out of school and thousands of basic schools under trees and dilapidated structures, including lacking electricity and basic digital infrastructure, committing less than a quarter of the total education envelope to Basic, Inclusive and Special Education, and Complementary Education is uninspiring towards achieving the SDG Goal 4 target of Universal Basic Enrolment and Completion by 2030,” the report scathingly observes.
Eduwatch also ripped into the unfair distribution of funds, noting that while about a quarter of Tertiary Education’s budget comes from its own internally generated funds, Second Cycle Education is entirely publicly funded. This, Eduwatch argues, points to a “cost-inefficient wholesale free Second Cycle Education system,” largely driven by its expensive boarding nature.
Maintaining this costly Second Cycle Education system, the analysis firmly asserts, means “depriving Basic Education of critical funding,” making it impossible for Ghana to meet key SDG 4 targets by 2030, which demand at least 40% of the total education budget for basic education.
In light of these alarming findings, Eduwatch has laid out a series of urgent recommendations to fix Ghana’s broken education financing:
* Increase Basic Education’s Share: The Ministry of Education must boost basic education’s slice of the total education budget to at least 40%. Specific increases are also recommended for inclusive education (at least 2%) and complementary education (at least 2%).
* Free Up GETFund: To free up resources for infrastructure development, Eduwatch wants the Ministry of Finance to revert to funding Free Senior High School (SHS) from petroleum revenues (ABFA) and the Consolidated Fund, allowing GETFund to focus on its core mandate of infrastructure.
* Timely Fund Releases: Ensure education funds are released on time to improve budget execution and policy implementation.
* Boost School-Based Assessments: Allocate supplementary funding for School-Based Assessments, which the current Capitation Grant cannot adequately cover.
* Reform School Feeding Programme: Decentralize management of the Ghana School Feeding Programme, boost transparency, strengthen accountability, and introduce an inflation indexation for annual budget adjustments.
* GETFund for Infrastructure: The Ministry of Education should commit at least 60% of the 2025 GETFund budgetary allocation to education infrastructure, prioritizing basic education.
* Capitation Grant Overhaul: Improve disbursement, transparency, and accountability of the Capitation Grant at district and school levels, align it strictly with School Performance Improvement Plans, and implement an inflation indexation mechanism.
* Invest in Student Loans: The government should invest in the Students Loan Scheme for all public Tertiary Education students. Eduwatch argues that the continuous payment of teacher trainees’ allowances (GHC 207 million earmarked for 2025) is wasteful and could be added to the Student Loan Trust to benefit all tertiary students.
While Ghana’s 2025 education budget shows some improvement, Eduwatch is clear: it falls critically short of all international funding benchmarks. Basic Education continues to be neglected compared to Second Cycle and Tertiary Education.
The education think tank stresses that Ghana must urgently allocate at least 20% of its national budget to education and, crucially, ensure that 40% of this funding is directed towards basic education.
These benchmarks are not just recommendations; they are indispensable if the country is to realistically achieve all targets under SDG 4 by 2030, securing a foundational and equitable education for every citizen.
Will the government heed this urgent call, or will Ghana’s educational future remain imperiled by inadequate funding and skewed priorities?