Rural connectivity: Ghana strengthens its partnership with Huawei
March 10th 2026
Ghanaian authorities are seeking to accelerate digital inclusion in the country. According to ITU data, approximately 30% of the Ghanaian population still did not use the internet at the end of 2024.
Ghana aims to strengthen its partnership with Chinese company Huawei to improve mobile phone services in rural areas. The Ghana Investment Fund for Electronic Communications (GIFEC) held discussions with the equipment manufacturer last week on the sidelines of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.
The meeting focused on exploring technological solutions to support the expansion and improvement of GIFEC’s Rural Telephony Project (RTP), an initiative to extend telecommunications infrastructure and digital connectivity to underserved or unserved communities across Ghana.
During this meeting, the Huawei team presented a range of advanced rural telephony solutions, including the latest version of the RTP project’s telecommunications towers. These infrastructures are designed to improve connectivity in remote areas by providing a reliable network capable of supporting higher-performance voice and data services. The company also demonstrated how these improved systems could enhance network quality and extend coverage in rural communities.
According to Tanko Rashid-Computer (pictured, left), managing director of GIFEC, strengthening infrastructure and improving network solutions would facilitate the deployment of 3G and 4G services in these communities, thereby promoting better access to digital opportunities, information services and socio-economic development.
This meeting comes as the Ghanaian government aims to provide 90% coverage to rural communities by 2028. Within the framework of the RTP project, GIFEC reports on its dashboard that it has deployed 1,897 telecom sites since 2017. Approximately 77% of these infrastructures fall under the “Ghana Rural Telephony and Digital Inclusion” project, unveiled in November 2020, which includes 2,016 sites. The program benefits from technical support from Huawei and financial backing from the China Exim Bank, which granted the Ghanaian government $155 million in funding in 2020.
As a reminder, approximately 42% of Ghana’s population lives in rural areas, according to World Bank data. Official Ghanaian sources indicate that in 2022, around 30% of the population lived in unconnected rural areas. According to data from the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Ghana is projected to have an internet penetration rate of 72.2% by 2025, compared to 73.1% for mobile phone penetration by 2025.
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