The Finance Minister says the economy would suffer a downward slide for about two to three years, as government tries to rebuild the economy.

Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express, Ken Ofori-Atta said, “I had indicated what I termed trapezoid recovery which means sort of the plummeting impact of the 6.8% to the 0.9% and the slow slide potentially downwards for about two, three years before we pick up again.”

His comments follow the novel coronavirus’ dire impact on the economy as many businesses have had to shut down in order to mitigate the spread of the virus.

Earlier in April, the Finance Minister had bemoaned the country losing more than $1 billion of revenue as a result of government’s attempt to deal with the pandemic.

The central bank had also expressed fears the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) will collapse growth in the economy to 2.5 per cent in 2020.

However, the Minister says the government’s strong efforts to revive the economy might pay off eventually in the coming years should bolder steps be taken.

“I’m a lot more confident of the resilience we have shown and I think if we intervene very strongly and put classical economics aside, and say we’re going to intervene boldly and make sure that the supply response comes, get people working, get people independent, I think we’ll come out much faster,” he said.