Good corporate governance in the banking sector alone cannot promote robust and sustainable economic growth for all, says the Second Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Elsie Addo Awadzi.

According to her, it takes strong governance in all of corporate Ghana and the public sector to ensure that the country achieves the economic transformation it desires.

She said this at a virtual meeting organised by the Institute of Directors-Ghana for the launch of the National Corporate Governance Code Development Project.

She explained that "the extent to which the banking sector can continue to lend to the private sector and the public sector, indeed, the extent to which all parts of the financial sector can provide funding to businesses, is directly related to the extent to which corporate governance is promoted in Ghana."

This, she says, is why the creation of the National Corporate Governance Code is integral to the establishment and sustenance of a sustainable Ghanaian economy.

"We also recognise that the efforts of other regulators, and in fact, other stakeholders are helping to move Ghana towards the same goal of a strong, inclusive, and sustainable economy, and by extension, a strong nation.

"It is also encouraging to note that Ghana's new Companies Act of 2019, 699 to, which I call the minimum common denominator in governance for all companies of all sizes incorporated in Ghana, has elevated corporate governance standards for all companies, and including the qualifications and duties and obligations of board members," she said.

She added, "Similarly, provisions of a Public Financial Management Act of 2016 691, the state's interest and governance authority access to act of 2019 699, and a few others have all raised the bar for the governance of public sector institutions, including state-owned enterprises to promote transparency, accountability and prudent in the management of the oppressed for the benefit of all demands."

Elsie Addo Awadzi stated that the Corporate Governance Code was a shared responsibility for Ghanaians to organise their way of doing business according to a set of values corporate Ghana can identify with.

"And that would help to secure a future where our individual efforts help us achieve outcomes that make us all the better off the identification and articulation of such values, and a set of principles and prescriptions that will guide how we do business across sectors will go a long way to help us realise the future that we all deserve for generations to come," she said.

She was hopeful that the work on Ghana's National Corporate Governance Code will be "inclusive, will be thorough, and will be authentic to Ghana, and more importantly will draw on work done by stakeholders, including regulators, like the Bank of Ghana, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Ghana Stock Exchange, and others, as well as even private sector initiatives like Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, among others."