For as long as many of us can remember, Ghana has positioned financial inclusion as a cornerstone of national development, and rightly so. Globally, financial inclusion is recognized as a transformative engine for poverty reduction, shared prosperity, and economic stability.

It sits at the heart of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG 1 (No Poverty), SDG 5 (Gender Equality), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), and SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities) (United Nations, 2015).

Countries such as Kenya, India, and Bangladesh have demonstrated what is possible when access to finance becomes truly inclusive. Kenya, for instance, expanded formal financial access from 26% in 2006 to over 83% in 2021, largely driven by the expansion of mobile money platforms, such as M-Pesa (FinAccess Household Survey, 2021).

India, through its landmark Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) financial inclusion program, opened more than 500 million bank accounts between 2014 and 2023 (Government of India, Ministry of Finance, PMJDY Progress Report, 2023), shifting millions from financial exclusion to meaningful participation in the economy.

These cases demonstrate that financial inclusion can shift economies from fragmentation to productivity, and from vulnerability to resilience.

Yet as we enter 2026, a crucial question lingers for Ghana: Have informal sector workers genuinely experienced improved access to credit and social protection, or do long-standing gaps continue to undermine our progress?

Despite national strategies and the rapid growth of digital financial services, exclusion remains widespread particularly among informal workers, and even more so in rural communities, where access to credit and insurance remains limited (World Bank Global Findex, 2021; Ghana Living Standards Survey 7, GSS 2019).

Much has changed since my MBA thesis in 2019 on financial inclusion and the role of regulators. Digital systems have expanded, new financial products have emerged, and national policies have evolved.

Yet the core barriers I examined years ago, limited awareness, high borrowing costs, bureaucratic processes, and weak insurance uptake, remain stubbornly unchanged. With so much progress having been made, why hasn’t access improved at the same pace as innovation? Are we overlooking something fundamental?

The data is sobering. According to the World Bank Global Findex (2021), only 55% of adults in Ghana have access to formal financial services. Millions of traders, farmers, artisans, and small business owners continue to rely on informal mechanisms such as Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs), moneylenders, and family networks.

The Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS 7) reinforces this pattern, showing that while the informal sector accounts for nearly 80% of Ghana’s workforce, participation in formal insurance, particularly pensions and microinsurance remains critically low.

If financial inclusion has been a priority for more than a decade, why are those who need financial services the most still excluded?

To be fair, Ghana has achieved notable progress. The National Financial Inclusion and Development Strategy (NFIDS), implemented between 2018 and 2023 with World Bank support, helped expand access to credit, savings, payments and insurance for underserved groups. Complementary policies such as the Digital Financial Services Policy, the Cash-Lite Roadmap, and the rollout of foundational infrastructure National ID (Ghana Card), GhanaPost GPS, and mobile money interoperability have transformed onboarding processes and made transactions more seamless.

These reforms contributed to an increase in urban financial inclusion from 41% in 2014 to over 60% by 2021.

This growth was propelled by forward-thinking regulatory actions from the Bank of Ghana, including the 2015 guidelines for e-money issuers, agent banking frameworks, and Ghana’s landmark 2018 interoperability system, which made the country the first in Africa to achieve full bank-to-wallet interoperability.

Yet despite these advances, findings from a recent assessment by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), under the AVID II Project supported by STAR Ghana Foundation and the Hewlett Foundation, show that the lived realities of informal workers have shifted far less than the policy landscape.

Through focus groups and interviews with traders in Kumasi and peasant farmers in the Northern Region, the baseline assessment revealed persistent structural barriers that continue to keep informal workers at the margins of the financial system.

Our engagements began with listening sessions among traders and farmers. Their accounts highlighted challenges that have remained unchanged for years: high interest rates, collateral constraints, complex loan processes, low awareness of available insurance products, deep mistrust in financial institutions, weak record-keeping systems, and widespread misconceptions about claims and benefits. For many, these barriers have become part of their lived experience.

The numbers reflect this reality: in Kumasi, about 40 out of 50 traders had taken credit at least once, often through group-based lending arrangements. Yet only a handful of 5 traders had ever attempted insurance, and just two had enrolled in a pension scheme. Among peasant farmers in Northern Ghana, barely 10 to 15 respondents reported accessing loans, and none had engaged with insurance, largely due to the unpredictability of seasonal income.


Institutional Perspectives

Conversations with financial institutions, insurers, and the National Insurance Commission (NIC) uncovered a more layered understanding of these constraints. Banks explained that collateral requirements are tied to prudential regulations and unavoidable for risk management, even though group lending and association-based guarantees offer viable alternatives.

Interest rates, they noted, are determined by macroeconomic fundamentals such as inflation and the cost of funds, limiting the flexibility institutions have to lower borrowing costs.

Still, institutions pointed to various products designed specifically for informal workers, including subsidized Small and Medium-sized Enterprise (SME) loans supported by the Mastercard Foundation, agric-targeted loan facilities with flexible repayment cycles, microinsurance packages for traders and farmers, SSNIT informal sector schemes, and dedicated claims support mechanisms.

Yet despite this range of products, awareness remains remarkably low, particularly in rural communities.

Trust deficits worsen the problem. Beneficiaries worry that claims will not be honored, while insurers grapple with fraudulent claims that require lengthy verification. This creates a cycle in which mistrust suppresses uptake, and low uptake weakens the effectiveness of tailored products.

Operational challenges complicate matters further. Many informal workers lack proper documentation, making risk assessment difficult for lenders. Insurers shared stories of clients signing forms without understanding their obligations or benefits, leading to disputes that deepen mistrust.

The NIC acknowledged that while it plays a central role in protecting policyholders and regulating insurers, its visibility at the community level remains limited, something it hopes to address through stronger partnerships with CSOs.

Beyond Policy Gaps

Across all dialogues from Kumasi to Tamale, one message echoed consistently: the problem is no longer a shortage of policies or products. The real gap lies in information, trust, accessibility, and coordination. The supply side is ready, Products exist. But the systems for reaching informal workers remain weak and disconnected.

This realization led us to reexamine our initial assumptions. At the beginning of this project and even in my earlier academic work, the prevailing belief was that policy inadequacies were the primary cause of exclusion.

But after engaging both communities and institutions, it became clear that Ghana does not suffer from a policy gap as much as it suffers from an awareness gap, a literacy gap, a collaboration gap, a rural access gap, and an income stability gap. The consistency of these issues across both the southern and northern corridors reveals a national challenge not isolated pockets of exclusion.

The Gaps Holding Inclusion Back

These insights now shape the direction of our advocacy as we prepare for a National Dialogue on Financial Inclusion and Social Protection. The purpose of this dialogue is to bring stakeholders together to translate findings into action.

The aim is to design a unified national strategy, rather than a patchwork of isolated interventions, and to focus on solving real barriers rather than theoretical policy shortcomings.

The 2026 National Budget outlines reforms in Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSME) financing, agricultural modernization, digital payments, and expanded social protection, but the critical question is whether these measures will sufficiently address the awareness, literacy, trust, and access gaps consistently highlighted throughout our engagements.

Financial inclusion and social protection are not abstract policy aspirations they are essential for the survival, resilience, and dignity of millions of Ghanaians in the informal sector.

Closing these gaps requires coordinated action across government agencies, regulators, financial institutions, insurance providers, district assemblies, civil society organizations, and the communities themselves. The evidence is unequivocal: unless Ghana addresses awareness, literacy, trust, and rural access, policy reforms alone will not deliver inclusive prosperity.

The time has come for Ghana to move beyond fragmented interventions toward collaborative, community-driven, nationally aligned solutions that finally bridge the divide for informal workers.