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The Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has explained why the government has, over the past seven years, resorted to digitalizing Ghana's economy.

Speaking at the 20th edition of the Ghana Club 100 Awards in Accra on Friday, Dr. Bawumia explained that the government inherited a largely informal economy which made room for certain ills hindering the transformation of the economy.

"Before you can build an economy that is going to be transformational, policies that are going to be transformational, you need to take care of major problems that are in the informal economy.

"When we came into office, we were facing some major challenges in the area of the informal economy", Dr. Bawumia said. 

Dr. Bawumia added that an informal economy allows indiscipline into the society with "no significant consequences for bad actions".

"You have a society where corruption prevails, you have lawlessness. You have a tax dodging society, you have an unbanked society. You have a loan repayment society, identity fraud; that is people assuming the identities of others or fake identities, lack of address systems, age cheating, fake insurance, fake birth certificates, no passport, ghost workers on government payroll, etc", he expounded.

These ills of the informal economy, Dr. Bawumia stressed, makes it difficult for an economy to transform.

"That is why we set out to formalize the economy to make sure that the economy worked on transparent systems and that area of formalization of the economy, we relied heavily on digitization of the economy to formalize the economy."

On this journey of formalizing the economy through digitalization, Dr. Bawumia noted, "we have been moving very steadily and we have made a lot of progress in this particular area".

Dr. Bawumia also highighted the significant role the Ghana Card has played in the formalization of the economy.

"Of course, the anchor for this digitalization programme has been the Ghana Card that we issued. And today, we have enrolled over 17 million people to the Ghana Card. We have linked all bank accounts to the Ghana Card, linked all sim cards to the Ghana Card. Your tax identification number is your Ghana Card. Your NHIS number is your Ghana Card. We have linked the Ghana Card number to the Controller and Accountant General Department payroll.

"Today, we are seeing this increasing formalization of the economy as a result of digitalization...What all of this is doing is that...it makes the systems clearer. It reduces corruption because you can apply for services, buy electricity, get a licence, get a passport without going to meet any who will ask for bribe."

Dr. Bawumia stressed the need for these significant transformational programmes to continue to enhance Ghana's economic development.