The government has uncapped the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund) to ensure the full financing of the Free Senior High School (SHS) programme.
It will also support the funding of free tertiary education for Persons with Disabilities (PWDs).
The government also allocated GH¢292.4 million for the free distribution of sanitary pads to female students in primary and secondary schools to address menstrual hygiene challenges, which force female students to miss school days.
The Minister of Finance, Dr Cassiel Ato Forson, announced the measures when he presented the 2025 Budget and Economic Policy of the government to Parliament yesterday.
He said the move to dedicate funding to the Free SHS policy was to address concerns about its quality and sustainability.
To achieve that, he said the Earmarked Funds Capping and Realignment Act, 2017 (Act 947), to free up public funds in the Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) for various purposes in 2017, would be amended to remove the cap on GETFund and other earmarked funds.
In addition, he said the GETFund Act would also be revised to ensure full funding of the Free Senior High School programme.
With the change, he said, an additional GH¢4.1 billion would accrue to GETFund, supplementing the GH¢3.5 billion already allocated for the Free SHS in the 2024 Budget.
Dr Forson also stated that the government would absorb the debt service on the Daakye Bond, a financial instrument issued by the GETFund to raise funds for education-related projects.
Improving learning conditions
To improve learning conditions, he said the government had allocated GH¢564.6 million for free curriculum-based textbooks.
“Mr Speaker, we have also allocated an amount of GH¢564.6 million for the comprehensive provision of free curricula-based textbooks covering four sets of KG books and workbooks for about 2.8 million learners, four sets of primary textbooks for 800,000 learners and nine sets of JHS 3 textbooks for 540,000 learners,” Dr Ato Forson said.
Additionally, he said the School Feeding Programme had received a budget boost from GH¢1.34 billion in 2024 to GH¢1.788 billion in 2025.
That, he said, would raise the feeding cost per child per meal from GH¢1.50 to GH¢2.
Furthermore, the minister said the government was committed to sustaining teacher and nursing trainee allowances and had, therefore, allocated GH¢203 million for teacher trainee allowances and GH¢480 million for nursing trainee allowances.
Relief for tertiary students
In a bid to ease the financial burden on tertiary students, the finance minister said the government had introduced the ‘No-Fees-Stress’ initiative, under which all first-year students in public tertiary institutions would not pay academic fees.
He announced that GH¢499.8 million had been allocated for the No-Fees-Stress policy.
Also, Dr Forson said the government was taking steps to address menstrual hygiene challenges in schools by allocating GH¢292.4 million for the free distribution of sanitary pads to female students in primary and secondary schools.
Additionally, he said the Capitation Grant, which provided funding to basic schools, had been increased from GH¢84 million in 2024 to GH¢145.5 million in 2025, representing a 73.2 per cent increase.
Source: Graphic Online