The Ghana Meteorological Agency (GMet) says the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) owes it more than GH¢50 million in outstanding statutory payments.
According to GMet, the arrears have affected its ability to meet some of its statutory financial obligations and sustain its operations.
Under the amended Ghana Meteorological Agency Act, 2019 (Act 1002), the GCAA is required to remit 10 per cent of en-route, overflight and landing fees to GMet, while the Ghana Airports Company Limited (GACL) is required to remit five per cent of airport passenger taxes to the agency.
GMet said an agreement was reached at a meeting in March 2026 for the GCAA to settle the outstanding arrears following the amendment of the law in 2019. However, the agency said the payment had yet to be fully honoured.
Speaking in an interview with Citi News on Tuesday, August 18, Director-General of the Ghana Meteorological Agency, Dr Eric Asuman, said one of the major challenges confronting GMet was its inability to access the GCAA’s flight database to independently determine and monitor the fees on which its statutory share is based.
He said repeated attempts by GMet to gain access to the relevant flight data had not yielded the desired results, making it difficult for the agency to verify the amounts due to it.
Dr Asuman explained that without access to the database, GMet could not effectively monitor flight movements or determine whether the statutory payments made by the GCAA accurately reflected the fees collected.
He described the issue as a longstanding challenge between the two agencies and called for a mechanism to enable GMet to independently verify the data used to calculate its statutory entitlement.
“Somewhere in 2023, Ghana Airport Company started paying its share of its contribution to Ghana Meteorological Agency as stated by the Act. And what they did was to request IATA, as an international air transport institution, to set GMeT up in their system so that GMeT’s share of the fund will be sent to GMeT directly.
“IATA advised that Civil Aviation should give them an authorisation letter, authorising them to do the same for their share that should come to GMeT.
He added, “But as we speak, since 2023 till now, that letter has not been sent. And when they also receive their funds, they don’t transmit the GMeT component, which is 10% landing, 10% en route, as stipulated by law to GMeT.
“And it has been a serious challenge and a banter between the two institutions to the extent that the parliamentary select committee intervened on this matter. And so it is true. By law, they are supposed to give us this money, but they are not complying as stipulated by law.”
Dr Asuman said the outstanding payments were placing additional financial pressure on GMet at a time when the agency needed increased resources to strengthen weather forecasting, aviation meteorology and other services critical to national development.
