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The history of the Bank can be traced to the end of the Second World War (WWII). Agitations from the indigenes against foreign imports led to a general boycott by the local population led by the Association of West African Merchants (AWAM). The colonial administration decided to establish an entity that would facilitate the involvement of private indigenous persons in business. The Gold Coast Industrial Development Corporation (GCIDC) was therefore established in 1952 with budgetary appropriations to enable it provide financial support to the indigenes for the establishment of their own businesses.



The Gold Coast Industrial Development Corporation (GCIDC), encouraged entrepreneurship among the indigenes in the areas of furniture making and baking. This intervention helped develop the skills of the local carpenters and bakers in the use of mechanized saw mills as well as electric bakeries. GCIDC also upgraded the skills of people who were washing garments, etc manually by mechanizing laundry activity considering that the Gold Coast intelligentsia were shipping their suits to the United Kingdom for laundry.



The Act also paved the way for NIB to set up joint ventures because the Ghanaian manufacturers or the private sector did not have the required funding for start-ups. NIB however, could lend to enterprises and put in equity. NIB set up over 100 joint enterprises including some of the defunct regional development corporations. Most of the major existing industries including Nestle Ghana Limited, Novotel (now Accra City Hotel), Kabel Metal (now Nexans Kabelmetal), Aluworks benefited from equity participation or funding.

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