E-commerce is the use of digital technologies to conduct commercial transactions, including online shopping, payment processing, and supply chain management. The E-commerce industry in Ghana is growing, with various online shopping platforms available. The first e-commerce website in Ghana was eshopafrica.com, which was founded by Cordelia Salter-Nour in 1999.
The website launched officially in February 2001 and sold products mainly manufactured in Ghana like baskets, carvings, jewellery, kente cloth, and collectibles. Over the years, the industry has grown, and more players have emerged, such as jumia.com.gh, superprice.com, kikuu.com.gh, melcomonline.com, jiiji.com.gh and zoobashop.com.
According to Sengretsi (2020), 83.5% of e-commerce websites in Ghana are less than ten years old, with the average age of their domains being around five years. Grouping the sites by categories, the fashion industry came out on top, followed by the electronics industry, covering laptops, phones, and other electrical gadgets. Superstores or e-commerce websites in Ghana that sold a bit of everything came in third. Baby and toys, food and groceries, and miscellaneous rounded up the top five.
The Covid-19 pandemic accelerated the adoption of e-commerce and delivery services in Ghana, including the online purchase of restaurant and other takeout food, as well as the online purchase of consumer goods, clothes, and electronics (ITA, 2022). Ghana has approximately 15 million internet users who are buying online every day, and leading local eCommerce platforms include
Hubtel, Jumia, Plendify, Jiji, as well as Uber Eats and Bolt Food. Additionally, eCommerce in Ghana is supported by the robust, relatively affordable mobile data access provided by telecom operators MTN, AirtelTIGO, Glo, and Vodafone (ITA, 2022).