For seven years, Ms. Samiratu Sakibu has built Mira Taste Services one product at a time.
But between the dream and the expansion lies a maze of permits, inspections, renewals and regulatory requirements that she says can be frustrating and unnecessarily repetitive.
“I don’t understand why,” she says, questioning why her business must pay for a business operating permit and also a property-related permit for the same premises.
She said: “I have to pay for my business operating permit. We are also asked to pay for a property permit because the property belongs to us and we have a shop in front of it.”
Her experience reflects findings from a study by the Institute for Liberty and Policy Innovation (ILAPI), which says Ghana’s regulatory environment is imposing significant financial and administrative burdens on micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), limiting their ability to formalise, expand and create jobs.
The study, based on a survey of 600 MSMEs conducted between September 2024 and July 2025, found that MSMEs account for about 92 per cent of businesses and contribute nearly 70 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Yet, ILAPI says their potential remains largely untapped because of overlapping institutional mandates, excessive documentation, inconsistent enforcement and prolonged registration and compliance processes.
For Ms. Sakibu, those findings are not abstract statistics.
They are the fees she pays, the forms she completes, the inspections she undergoes and the hours she spends navigating the system instead of concentrating on her business.
Compliance has a price
She registered Mira Taste Services with the Office of the Registrar of Companies (ORC) in 2019.
Registration, however, was only the beginning.
Her business must deal with requirements involving the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assembly (MMDA), the Ghana National Fire Service, the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA) and other institutions.
Because the business uses gas and other potentially flammable materials, she must also meet fire-safety requirements.
She says the fire extinguisher required for her operations costs about GH¢500, with further payments required when it is due for renewal or refilling.
Her concern is not with fire safety; it is with what she sees as repeated costs.
“If it is something I have already purchased the previous year and I just need a refill, I don’t understand why I should pay the same amount as buying a brand new one,” she says.
“The fees for registrations and permits are not outrageous. It is not something we cannot afford. The problem is the duration and the redundant processes.”
The ILAPI’s findings provide context to that frustration.
The study found that the average cost of obtaining a business entry certificate was GH¢1,030, while permits averaged GH¢1,275 and licenses GH¢1,600. Some businesses spent as much as GH¢3,000 on licenses.
Business registration costs ranged from GH¢60 to GH¢2,000.
For larger companies, such expenses may be manageable. For a small business operating with limited working capital, however, every additional payment can compete with money needed for equipment, stock or workers.
One business, several regulators
Ms Sakibu’s frustration becomes more apparent when she describes the number of institutions involved in regulating her business.
The assembly handles hygiene permits, while the FDA deals with facility and product approval. The FDA also inspects the facility and provides guidance on product positioning and labelling.
Her question is simple: why can’t some of these processes be coordinated?
“If the FDA also wants to inspect my facility and give me approval, why don’t they merge?” she asks.
ILAPI’s research identifies overlapping institutional mandates as one of the weaknesses in Ghana’s regulatory environment.
The study says businesses may obtain approval from one institution, secure a sector license from another, and then undergo similar inspections by multiple agencies.
It cites the Ghana Standards Authority, FDA, Environmental Protection Agency, public health authorities and municipal authorities as institutions whose requirements can overlap.
For MSMEs, the consequence is not simply inconvenience.
Repeated inspections, applications and payments consume both money and time.
Some businesses may pass those costs on to consumers. Others absorb them, reducing their ability to invest in growth.
ILAPI warns that the burden can also discourage some entrepreneurs from formalising their businesses.
When waiting becomes a business cost
For her, the frustration is sometimes less about the fee than the uncertainty surrounding the process.
She says the assembly already has her business details and contact information, yet renewal reminders often arrive only about a week before a permit expires.
“If you have my details and a digital platform, why don’t you send me a reminder three months before, instead of just one week?” she asks.
The concern is one of predictability.
A business owner needs to know when a permit will expire, how much renewal will cost and how long the process will take to plan effectively.
ILAPI found that 40.8 per cent of surveyed businesses took more than one month to obtain their business entry certificates.
Only 17 per cent completed the process within one week, while 22.8 per cent took three to four weeks, and 13.8 per cent took one to two weeks.
ILAPI says such delays create opportunity costs because entrepreneurs spend time following up on applications instead of producing, selling, managing workers or expanding their businesses.
In effect, it says, delayed and expensive registration can become a tax on formal entrepreneurship.
Digitisation is not enough
Ghana has increasingly turned to digital platforms to make public services faster and more accessible.
But Ms Sakibu’s experience shows that putting a service online does not automatically make it accessible.
When she went to the FDA to register one of her products, she was told that the process had been digitised and that she should use the authority’s website.
She was given the website address. But when she opened it, she could not navigate the process.
“I opened the website and wasn’t able to operate it,” she says. The challenge, therefore, is not simply whether a service is digital. It is whether the entrepreneur can actually use it.
ILAPI assessed 10 major regulatory agencies based on online application processes, access to information on fees and availability of application forms.
The study found significant gaps in digital accessibility and recommended that even where physical inspections remained necessary, documentation and routine administrative processes should be accessible remotely.
For entrepreneurs like Ms. Sakibu, a digital system without adequate guidance can simply move the frustration from a government office to a computer screen.
The worker who has not been hired
The regulatory burden becomes more consequential when it begins to affect employment.
She says she could employ eight additional people. Currently, she has employed herself, an assistant production worker and a delivery worker.
“Right now, because of the time, the permits, and the payments, we are limited,” she says.
The statement captures the wider economic consequence of regulatory complexity.
A permit is not just a document; a delay is not just a delay; a cost is not simply a figure on a receipt.
Together, they can determine whether a business has enough money and time to employ another person.
The ILAPI’s research found that businesses reported regulatory compliance could absorb up to 30 per cent of their capital or profit. The institute argues that businesses may secure financing for expansion only to find a significant portion consumed by compliance requirements.
That can slow the transition from a survival-orientated micro-business to a growing employer.
Why businesses struggle to grow
The ILAPI describes this challenge as part of Ghana’s “missing middle” problem.
Its findings show a full transition rate from micro to medium enterprises of 28.2 per cent, meaning roughly three out of every 10 micro businesses in the study reached medium scale.
The transition from micro to small took about eight years, while the full transition from micro to medium could take approximately nine to 12 years.
Regulatory overload is identified as one of the factors contributing to the slow progression.
Businesses unable to meet regulatory requirements may stop operating or remain informal, limiting their capacity to expand and employ more people.
Ms. Sakibu’s experience illustrates the human dimension of that problem.
After seven years, she is still thinking about the next stage of growth.
She has the ambition, but the journey is not simply about finding customers or increasing production.
It is also about navigating a system that can make growth more expensive and time-consuming than it needs to be.
What about the 24-Hour Economy?
The issue becomes even more important as Ghana seeks to expand economic activity beyond conventional working hours.
The ILAPI says businesses participating in the 24-Hour Economy will need additional workers to operate shifts, which will require more working capital.
If significant portions of that capital are absorbed by regulatory compliance, businesses may have less money available to hire.
The institute argues that reducing the number of certificates, shortening processing times and lowering compliance costs could allow businesses to employ more people for night operations.
Those additional workers would earn incomes and contribute taxes, potentially expanding the state’s revenue base.
The question is therefore larger than whether an entrepreneur can obtain a permit.
It is whether the regulatory system is helping businesses become stronger employers or making that transition more difficult.
From more regulation to smarter regulation
The ILAPI says it is not calling for the removal of necessary regulation.
Rather, it is proposing a system that protects public interests without unnecessarily suffocating the businesses expected to drive economic growth.
Among its recommendations is a unified digital registration and licensing platform through which businesses could access multiple regulatory approvals through a coordinated process.
It also proposes mutual recognition agreements among agencies, joint inspections, decentralisation of routine registration and certification services to MMDAs, and a review of existing laws and licenses to identify overlaps.
For manufacturing, hospitality and other highly regulated sectors, it recommends sector-specific one-stop shops and progressive compliance standards that take the size and capacity of businesses into account.
The underlying principle is straightforward: regulation should protect without unnecessarily obstructing growth.
For Ms. Sakibu, that would mean a system that remembers her business details, gives her adequate notice before permits expire, coordinates inspections and makes digital services usable.
It would mean fewer hours spent chasing paperwork and more hours producing.
Most importantly, it could mean moving from an ambition to employ eight more people to actually hire them.
Seven years after starting Mira Taste Services, she has survived long enough to know that entrepreneurship requires persistence.
But persistence should not have to mean endlessly navigating avoidable bureaucratic obstacles.
“Sometimes you get so frustrated that you just want to give up,” she says.
For Ghana’s MSMEs, that frustration carries a cost far beyond the individual entrepreneur.
It can mean a product that never reaches the market, equipment that is never purchased, a business that never grows, and a worker who never gets hired.
For a country looking to turn its small businesses into engines of jobs and growth, making regulation smarter may be one of the most important investments it can make.
A GNA Feature by Laudia Anyorkor Nunoo
