TRADE LIBERALIZATION AND IMPORT REVENUE EVIDENCE FROM GHANA

Trade liberalisation has been at the centre of economic reforms in Ghana since 1983. This has led to an increase in the volume and value of imports which in turn is expected to increase import revenue in the country. The study uses Time Series data on Ghana to examine both the short and long term relationship between trade liberalisation and import revenue. It makes use of the Johansen and Juselius (1990) Cointegration tests and the Granger (1997) causality tests to examine both the long run and short run dynamics. The empirical result indicates that trade liberalization enhances imports both in the long-run and short-run. Again, the result shows that there is a positive unidirectional causality running from trade liberalisation to imports revenue without feedback in Ghana. This suggests that policies concerning imports can be boosted by trade liberalisation in the economy