Ghana’s Growing Gaming Industry

Africa is widely considered to be one of the fastest growing tech markets in the world as a whole as Ghana falls just a little behind Nigeria in the growth here, but that isn’t to say the numbers are small. Although there are no exact figures, there have been suggestions that a staggering 45% of adults take part in some form of online gaming, largely within the gambling sector.

This has been attributed to the young audience – much of Ghana’s population is comprised of people between the ages of 19 and 34 with a much more liberal and cosmopolitan lifestyle with much of modern society being influenced by foreigners, particularly those to the west and as such it’s no surprise that gambling in particular was able to grow much in the way that it has. Initially the country had largely rejected the industry as strict religious values still opposed it, however for the younger audience these values have faded in favour of a different way of life.

Much like the rest of the world, the online gambling industry in Africa is picking up a lot of steam and very quickly, and whilst some neighbouring countries have put restrictions on the growth in favour of protecting the land-based casinos, this doesn’t seem to be true in Ghana as the country continues to embrace the online alternatives – mobile gamblers will continue to have ready access to different services and with the widespread use of livestreaming, mobile betting will certainly continue to be a favourite amongst the audience too. With the huge potential for rewards and the changing attitudes, Ghana could cement itself as a gambling hub in Africa.

There are some changes being seen elsewhere however, in an attempt to curb the growing number of young users and problem gamers in countries such as the UK, measures have been put in place to slow things down – the introduction of the Gamstop initiative aimed at reducing participation options and a recent ban on credit card gambling was introduced to limit payment options – despite this many operators have found ways to continue delivering their services as maximumcasinos.com and others are able to deliver a growing number of sites not on Gamstop for players to enjoy. With the industry rising so quickly in Ghana, it may not be surprising to see some similar level of restriction placed in due time to gain a bit of a handle on the growing numbers.

Ghana still has to overcome the challenge of the lack of online regulations too – whilst the land-based casinos have placed the country on the map and continue to be well regulated, the online space is currently a bit of a free-for-all being dominated by foreign-based companies, in order to gain a handle on their own online space, Ghana will need to introduce some stricter regulation and revise the current Gaming Act – once this hurdle has been taken, Ghana will certainly be looking at the future for online gambling as a whole in the region.