Introduction
Cryptocurrency adoption in Africa is still picking up steam with a little percentage of the population getting involved in the buying and selling business. Even though there hardly has been clear regulations around this new kind of market, a bit of growth is still being witnessed in Ghana.
Inarguably Bitcoin is the gateway into the cryptocurrency ecosystem and it’s still the most popular in the country together with Ethereum and other altcoins. There are other altcoins that are mostly popular in group chats dedicated to citizens who are enthusiastic about cryptocurrencies but Bitcoin and Ethereum still stand tall.
The beginning
Using my personal experience as an example, I got to know about Bitcoin through a stranger who mentioned it in a conversation. I hardly found any information on the Ghanaian media to make any research on and I must say there’s little to no information relating to cryptocurrency, its history and usage. One way or the other I believe most people currently involved in cryptocurrency got in through family and friends. The journey mostly starts with purchasing Bitcoin and/or Ethereum with Mobile money or Bank transfers from merchants and currently with exchanges like Binance adding support for the local currency and making it tradable also in their peer-to-peer section on their exchange. Most people see it more of an investment like investing in stocks than an instrument that provides self-sovereignty and puts one in control of their financial assets.
Problem
The main hindrances to adoption of Cryptocurrency in a country like Ghana is the lack of education, unclear regulations and the ease of use. One will hardly find educational materials on the electronic media about the benefits and risks of cryptocurrency in Ghana. Only a few times will one find some news outlets post about cryptocurrencies and mostly they tend to be just news, like Elon Musk investing and accepting it as a payment option for his Tesla vehicles etc. Much education is needed to bring huge awareness about cryptocurrency in the country. Looking at the ease of use, a lot will have to be done, using an experience on the usage of the most common financial instrument, Mobile Money, as an example, most users still use the help of merchants when making personal withdrawals, in some instances, most users tell Mobile money merchants their secret pin to approve the withdrawal process. Imagine giving a phone with a Cryptocurrency funded wallet installed on it to a bad actor, it’ll be easier for them to do more harm to the owner than with a phone that has mobile money activated on it. In Cryptocurrency, everyone with a private key has access to that particular wallet and can restore it on almost any device to gain access. If the usage of cryptocurrency has to be the same as the usage of mobile money, it will be a huge risk for users who always need assistance by giving people direct access to their devices. There’s quite a long way to go to bring much adoption into the West African country.
Solution and Conclusion
The perfect path to take will be to get clear regulations, this is a major hurdle that needs to be overcome before any further paths can be taken. Once there are clear regulations, a simpler application or dApps with a good user interface can be a great step in the right direction. The populace are in search of financial freedom because of past events with some banking institutions over the last few years but I believe cryptocurrency can be the giant light at the tunnel for such people.
