The Africa Centre for Entrepreneurship and Youth Empowerment (ACEYE), a policy think-tank, ranked the region first in its 2024 edition of the Regional Entrepreneurship Freedom (REF) index.

The assessment highlights regional disparities and identifies areas where entrepreneurship freedom can be strengthened using 14 indicators.

They are regulation, financial freedom, freedom from corruption, monetary freedom, freedom from government, fiscal freedom, investment freedom, property rights, information freedom, market freedom, cultural freedom, technological freedom, labour freedom and trade freedom.

Speaking at the report launch, Mr Emmanuel Acquah, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of ACEYE, said the region performed creditably well except in the area of financial freedom and fight against corruption.

The Eastern, Volta and Ahafo regions were ranked second, third and fourth respectively as they were categorised as "mostly unfree".

The North East, Northern and Upper East regions were ranked fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth respectively as they were categorised as "repressed".

Mr Acquah explained that REF Index is an essential tool for evaluating the autonomy and decentralisation of entrepreneurial decision-making across regions.

Despite Ghana's ranking as "mostly unfree" by the Heritage Foundation Index of economic freedom 2024, he said the REF Index sought to empirically assess entrepreneurship freedom at a granular level.
He noted that the assessment was conducted through a survey where a mixed method approach was adopted to solicit response from 3200 respondents.

"We incorporated ethnographic methods, interviews and observation into the analysis..," he said.
The study has among other things recommended the reduction of tax burdens of SMEs, streamline activities of State agencies that perform duplicate roles in the SME space and Ghana Revenue
Authority must improve redress mechanisms for SME at the regional level.