Ghana or The Gambia
Two countries side by side across the same rows as the full comparison. A dash means the value is missing: fields are not filled with guesses. about the data
| Ghana | The Gambia | |
|---|---|---|
| Salary in IT | — | — |
| Citizenship | 5 years | — |
| Partner can work | — | — |
| Parents | — | — |
| Pets | difficult | difficult |
| Pet limit | no limit | no limit |
| Quarantine | no | — |
| Residence permit fee | — | — |
| Rent, 2 bedrooms | $ 632 · estimate | $ 122 · estimate |
| Basket | $ 29,3 | $ 19,2 |
| Life expectancy | 65.69 | 66.06 |
| Homicides/100k | 1.83 | — |
| Natural hazards, 0–10 | 3.3 | 2.9 |
How the two sets of routes differ
Long-stay routes in this reference: Ghana — 16, The Gambia — 6. Types present in both: work. Ghana adds: study, family, investment and repatriation.
Fees, thresholds and deadlines
Ghana: fees range from 40 to 18,000 USD. The Gambia: fees range from 100 to 7,700 GMD.
Beyond the first permit
Citizenship: Ghana after 5 years; the other country publishes no term.
Ghana in brief
Ghana is a West African country with English-language law based on the Immigration Act, 2000 (Act 573) and the Citizenship Act, 2000 (Act 591), which has allowed dual citizenship since 2000. Work immigration is structured through the Ghana Immigration Service's 'Work and Residence Permit' combination and, for investors, an automatic GIPC/GIPA immigrant quota sized to the company's paid-up capital. A distinctive feature of the country is two official channels for the diaspora of African descent: the Right of Abode permanent-residence status and a state citizenship programme launched in 2016 and continued by the Year of Return 2019 campaign. Importing dogs and cats does not require quarantine, but does require laboratory confirmation of the absence of several infections and current vaccination. Of the country's five largest districts by the 2021 census, one — Cape Coast — is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site tied to the history of the transatlantic slave trade.
The Gambia in brief
The Gambia is very cheap and very poor at the same time. **A monthly transit pass at 6.55 dollars is the cheapest in this guide**, and a one-bedroom in Banjul rents for 80 euros with utilities at 26. And alongside that: health spending of 25.74 dollars per person per year — fifth from the bottom among 167 countries. Life expectancy is 66.06 years, basic water access reaches 87.1 percent of the population, PM2.5 stands at 38.27 micrograms per cubic metre (the twenty-fourth highest of 170), and road deaths run at 22.0 per 100,000. Unemployment is 6.52 percent, and 10.86 among young people. Overall natural hazard is 2.9 out of 10 on INFORM and almost entirely water-borne: flooding 4.6, drought 3.0, coastal hazards 2.5, tsunami 1.1, with earthquakes and cyclones practically absent. On the World Bank scale the governance figures are appreciably better than the regional norm: political stability −0.02, control of corruption −0.33, rule of law −0.39 and government effectiveness −0.54. The Immigration Department sets out the procedure in detail. A visa may be single journey, multiple journey (valid no longer than 12 months), transit, diplomatic (heads of missions only, and free) or short visit for 90 days; ECOWAS citizens need no visa. The service states twice that issuing a visa does not guarantee entry: the final decision rests with the officer at the port of arrival. There are two classes of residence permit: A — to live without gainful employment (students, retirees, short business visits) — and B, to live and work. The distinction by nationality runs through everything: an ECOWAS citizen obtains a permit after up to 90 days in the country, while a non-ECOWAS citizen must reside for up to 56 days after admission before a permit can be issued at all, and additionally receives an Alien Card. Fees run from 3,100 to 7,700 dalasi. Hiring is bounded by a QUOTA rather than a procedure: 80 percent of a workforce must be Gambians and 20 percent foreigners with skills unavailable in the country, and the Ministry of Trade administers it. Working without a residence and work permit is an offence. Family is arranged without a document of its own: the children and direct dependants of a permit holder are covered by that same permit, but on reaching adulthood must obtain one of their own. What is not in this data: there is no permanent residence in the department's catalogue, but a catalogue is not a law, and the Immigration Act itself is not published, so the number of years to permanent residence is left empty. The department publishes no processing standard for any of the seven steps of its own "processing cycle". The road to citizenship, by contrast, is published and long: seven years of residence from the date of marriage, or fifteen years by naturalisation. For cats there is no data at all — the British veterinary certificate for The Gambia covers only dogs. The city's population is not given: no official source separating Banjul from its area could be found.
Other comparisons
Ghana or… Nigeria · Rwanda · Tunisia · Algeria · Tanzania · Kenya · South Africa · Angola
The Gambia or… Gabon · Madagascar · Sierra Leone · Uganda · Zambia · Eswatini · Lesotho · Mozambique
More on each: Ghana · The Gambia. Build your own comparison — up to four countries
This material is for reference and is not legal, tax or immigration advice. Visa rules, tax thresholds and prices change. Before deciding anything, check the official sources and consult a licensed professional in the relevant country.