Ghana Money & The Price of An Orange

So, the Ghanaian cedi was redenominated on July 1, 2007 so that what was once ¢ 10,000 is now 1 Ghana Cedis (GH¢). This is supposed to make the money a bit easier to manage and more easily correlate to the currency of other countries.

If you're used to the old system, for me the easiest way to remember the conversion is to move the decimal point 4 spaces to the left. So 50,000 is now 5; 500,000 is now 50, etc. Amounts less than GH¢ 1 are denoted Gp. More info can be found here.

At the time of this writing, GH¢ 1 is equal to $1.10 USD. (Currency Converter)

To get an idea of the buying power of a cedi, I asked a Ghanaian contact for the approximate costs of some common items:

1) a bottle of soda = Gp 30 (GH¢ .30, or ¢ 3,000)

2) a sachet of water = Gp 65 - Gp 75

3) an orange from a street vendor = Gp 5

4) a coconut from a street vendor = Gp 30

5) a cup of coffee in a coffee shop = GH¢ 2.50

6) a newspaper = Gp 50

7) a pizza = GH¢ 3.00 - GH¢ 15.00

Though some things in Ghana are very affordable from an American perspective, other things (especially those things directed at tourists) are not particularly cheap. Spending over $100 USD per night for a room is common for a 3 or 4 star hotel.