Publications

The economic costs of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Insights from a simulation exercise for Ghana

Globally, countries have resorted to social distancing, travel restrictions and economic lockdowns to reduce transmission of COVID-19. The socioeconomic costs of these blunt measures are expected to be high, especially in sub-Saharan Africa where many live hand-to-mouth and lack social safety nets. Social Accounting Matrix multiplier model results show that Ghana’s urban lockdown, although in force for only three weeks in April 2020, has likely caused GDP to fall by 27.9% during that period, while an additional 3.8 million Ghanaians temporarily became poor. Compared to the government’s revised GDP growth rate of 1.5% for 2020, the model predicts a contraction of 0.6 to 6.3% for 2020, depending on the speed of the recovery. The US$200 million budgeted for Ghana’s Coronavirus Alleviation Program will close only a small part of the estimated US$ 2.3 billion GDP gap between the fast recovery scenario and government’s revised GDP trajectory.

The use of the wetting front detector as an irrigation-scheduling tool for pepper production in the upper east region of Ghana: evidence from field experiment and farmers' perceptions

We compare the effect of the wetting front detector on yield and water productivity with farmers' practices (FP) and irrigation requirements based on crop water requirement calculation (IRCWR). A field experiment was conducted to assess the effect of the wetting front detector, FP and IRCWR combined with six fertilizer rates. We also interviewed 50 farmers to understand their perception about the use and associated concerns with the wetting front detector. Analysis of variance and partial budget economic analysis were performed. The results show that the wetting front detector saved 16% of irrigation water compared to FP, which in turn led to 16% labour saving to irrigate pepper as compared to FP. Yield and water productivity of pepper were not significantly affected by the irrigation regimes. Regardless of irrigation regimes, yield of pepper was significantly influenced by fertilizer treatment in both years. Although the highest fresh fruit yield of pepper (8.6 t ha-1 ) was recorded from Fortifer granules, the highest marginal rate of return was obtained from application of inorganic fertilizer including 173 N, 36 P,18 K ha ¹. The majority of farmers perceived the wetting front detector as low risk and compatible to use. The result also suggests that farmers are interested in buying and adopting the tool for future use.

Can local products compete against imports in West Africa? Supply- and demand-side perspectives on chicken, rice, and tilapia in Ghana

Negotiating the social contract in urban Africa: Informal food traders in Ghanaian cities

How do cities build a social contract with their diverse constituencies and foster political trust among the urban poor? This study focuses on informal traders, who constitute a major source of food security and employment in urban Africa. Centered on Ghana’s three main cities, we analyze interviews with metropolitan policymakers and a survey of approximately 1,200 informal traders. The findings show that expectations about reciprocity and procedural justice play a key role in shaping the probability of trusting one’s local government. Lower levels of trust were associated with disappointment over the lack of benefits that accompany tax payments to local assemblies. Moreover, those who had experienced harassment by city authorities were less likely to trust their local government. The analysis demonstrates that political trust at the subnational level deserves greater empirical attention, especially as countries continue to deepen decentralization initiatives and cities strive to meet global development goals around inclusivity.

The economic costs of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Insights from a simulation exercise for Ghana

The objective in this paper is to estimate the economic costs of COVID-19 policies and external shocks in a developing country context, with a focus on agri-food system impacts. Ghana is selected as a case study. Ghana recorded its first two cases of COVID-19 infection on 12 March 2020. The government responded by gradually introducing social distancing measures, travel restrictions, border closures, and eventually a partial, two-week “partial” lockdown in the country’s largest metropolitan areas of Accra and Kumasi. Social distancing measures have been enforced nationwide and include bans on conferences, workshops, and sporting and religious events, as well as the closure of bars and nightclubs. All educational institutions are also closed. The partial lockdown measures in urban areas directed all residents to remain home except for essential business, prohibited non-essential inter-city travel and transport, and only essential manufacturing and services operations were permitted to continue (The Presidency 2020). At the time the lockdown was announced, Ghana’s Ministry of Finance revised its GDP growth estimate for 2020 downwards from 6.8 to 1.5 percent (MoF 2020), although the Minister warned that growth could fall further if lockdown measures were extended. The lockdown was initially extended for a third week but was officially lifted on 20 April. Social distancing measures remain in place nationwide, although a gradual easing of restrictions commenced in June. Ghana’s borders remain closed at the time of writing.

To sell or consume? Gendered household decision-making on crop production, consumption, and sale in Malawi

Ghana's maize market

Maize is a widely consumed and cultivated staple crop in Ghana. It accounts for more than one-quarter of calories consumed, about double that of the second crop, cassava (GSS 2018). About three-quarters of maize consumption is from own production, suggesting maize has limited appeal as a cash crop (Gage et al. 2012). This is set to change as Ghana’s Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ) initiative, launched in 2017, prioritizes maize seed and fertilizer distribution and encourages market participation by smallholders (MoFA 2019). Already average maize output over the period 2017 to 2019 has been 40 percent higher than the average output achieved between 2013 and 2016 (MoFA 2020a). Government attributes this dramatic production response to PFJ. It is uncertain whether the maize market in Ghana can absorb increased this increased maize output without significant impacts on market prices or the profitability of maize cultivation.

Ghana's rice market

Rice is an important staple in Ghana and is cultivated across all agroecological zones. Paddy rice output grew at around 10 percent per annum between 2008 and 2019, with an especially sharp increase of 25 percent in 2019. However, domestic production continues to fall short of demand with the import share of rice consumed remaining above 50 percent (MoFA 2018). This reflects a growing preference for rice among Ghanaian households, especially as consumers become wealthier and more urbanized. The large dependence on rice imports heightens concerns around foreign exchange imbalances and vulnerability to international rice price shocks. Hence, the National Rice Development Strategy of 2009 and the Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ) campaign launched in 2017 not only prioritize rice but set ambitious expansion targets for domestic rice production (MOFA 2017a). Policy objectives include substituting rice imports and producing a higher-quality product that is more acceptable to Ghanaian consumers and can compete with imported rice.

Ghana's chili market

Chili pepper (Capsicum spp.) is an important spice and condiment used in many Ghanaian dishes. Alongside tomato and onion, chili ranks as one of Ghana’s three most important vegetable crops in terms of hectarage and crop value with significant potential for generating income, creating jobs, and contributing to foreign exchange through exports (Gonzalez et al. 2014). As is the case with other vegetable crops, chili production in Ghana is more profitable than producing traditional staple crops, such as maize and rice (Van Asselt et al. 2018). However, supply is highly seasonal as most production is rainfed. Chili yields in Ghana are also well below their potential. The government of Ghana has recognized this underexploited potential by designating chili as a priority crop under the Planting for Food Jobs (PFJ) initiative.

Ghana's tomato market

Tomatoes are a key component in the diets of Ghanaian households. Approximately 440,000 tons of tomato are consumed annually, equivalent to 40 percent of household vegetable expenditure (Van Asselt et al. 2018). Despite government support for the sector, national production has not increased much in the last decade, resulting in domestic supply falling far short of demand. While UN Comtrade (2019) trade statistics for 2007 to 2017 indicate that the country imported only around 8,000 tons of tomato annually, mainly from neighboring Burkina Faso, Van Asselt et al. (2018) put this figure at closer to 100,000 tons or one-quarter of domestic supply. Evidently, large quantities of tomato enter the country informally, making it difficult to estimate actual supply and demand patterns and devise appropriate marketing policies. The perishability of tomato is a major challenge and imparts significant risk on producers and traders. As such, post-harvest handling, transport, storage, and processing losses have been estimated at between 20 and 65 percent of production (Vowotor et al. 2012).

Comparing measures of urban food security in Accra, Ghana

The urban population in Sub-Saharan Africa is projected to expand by nearly 800 million people in the next 30 years. How this rapid urban transition is affecting household-level urban food security, and reverberating into broader food systems, is poorly understood. To fill this gap, we use data from a 2017 survey (n = 668) of low- and middle-income residents of Accra, Ghana, to characterize and compare the predictors of household-level food security using three established metrics: the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS); the Household Food Insecurity Access Prevalence (HFIAP); and the Food Consumption Score (FCS). According to HFIAP, 70% of sampled households are food insecure, but only 2% fall below acceptable thresholds measured by FCS. Only one household reported sourcing food from modern supermarkets and fewer than 3% produce food for consumption through gardening, farming, or fishing. Instead, households rely on purchased food from traditional markets, local stalls and kiosks, and street hawkers. Results from a suite of general linear models show that household assets, education, and demographic characteristics are significantly associated with food security outcomes according to HFIAS and HFIAP. The poor correlation and weak model agreement between dietary recall such as FCS, and experience-based food security metrics, like HFIAS and HFIAP, highlight limitations of employing historically rural-centric food security measurement approaches within the urban context. Given that Sub-Saharan Africa’s future is urban, our results add empirical evidence in support of the growing chorus of scholars advocating for comprehensive urban-oriented food security research and policy agendas across Sub-Saharan Africa.

Value chain development to benefit smallholders in Ghana: The effectiveness of selected interventions

This study examines interventions in two agricultural development projects in Ghana which aimed to build competitiveness of selected value chains to generate growth and reduce poverty – the Northern Rural Growth Project, implemented between 2009 and 2016, and the Market Oriented Agriculture Programme, which began in 2004 and is still in place. These projects aimed to sustainably increase rural households’ income through the development of inclusive and profitable agricultural commodity and food value chains to generate agricultural surpluses and to benefit from improved access to remunerative markets. In this study, the efficacy of four sorts of value chain interventions implemented by the two projects are examined in the context of the strengthening maize, pineapple, mango, and citrus value chains: • Facilitating interactions among value chain actors to encourage technical and institutional innovations, • Improving the operations of individual actors, such as producers, service providers, traders, and processors; • Helping develop new services for producers or initiating new producer institutions; and • Improving infrastructure. The study sought to identify how, where, and when might it be appropriate to intervene in value chains, particularly to benefit smallholders. While the lessons from this study do not comprehensively answer these questions, a better understanding is provided on the reasons behind the outcomes the projects attained in seeking to strengthen agricultural commodity value chains and some guidance is offered on how interventions aimed at doing so should be designed.

District Director of Agriculture in Ghana Survey

This data is from a study conducted with 80 directors of agriculture in Ghana’s Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs). The aim of the survey was to identify how the devolution of agriculture functions to the MMDAs since 2012 has affected their job functions and ability to provide agricultural services to the communities in which they work. The survey is split into 9 modules: 1. Location (LN) – preliminary characteristics of the location where the DDA is employed; the gender of the respondent is also recorded in this module 2. General Information (ID) – basic demographic and educational background, as well as the length of time the director has served in the MMDA 3. Employment History (EH) – details on the current job, number of previous jobs, district location of previous jobs, job experiences, and aspirations within the civil service 4. Agricultural Planning and Implementation (AP) – questions related to the agricultural planning process within the district 5. Agricultural Budgets and Expenditures (AB) – details on the agricultural budgeting and expenditure process 6. Engagement with the District Assembly (DA) – questions related to directors’ relationship with the other sectoral departments of the MMDA 7. Devolution Transition Process (DT) –details about the 2012 devolution transition process and the perceived challenges and opportunities that emerged from that reform 8. Staffing and Resources (SR) – opinions and perspectives of the directors on the staffing and resource availability in their offices 9. Final Section (FI) – enumerator observations

Informal Food Retail Trade in Ghanaian Cities

This data is from a study conducted on informal food retail in three of Ghana’s cities – Accra, Kumasi and Tamale. The aim of the survey is to gather information on the livelihoods of these traders, the challenges they face, and the governance constraints they encounter, especially those selling different types of food products. Interviews with 1,214 informal food vendors – 474 in Accra, 516 in Kumasi, and 310 in Tamale – across 4-7 markets in each city, allow for a better understanding of the role of informal food vendors as a key component of agricultural transformation and food security, while also examining how their treatment by government officials affects their own food security and their ability to facilitate agricultural transformation. The survey is split into 11 survey modules: Sampling (SA) – preliminary characteristics of the informal food trader General Information (ID) – basic demographic, educational and household background information Employment (EM) – details on current job Business (BS) – information on business management and the associated fees paid to operate Taxes and Fees (TX) – range of fees and taxes paid and the benefits received from those payments Government Engagement (GE) – type and level of interaction between government officials and food traders Food Safety and Food Security (FS) – awareness of food safety and source of personal food Service Delivery and Accountability (SD) – services offered in the market and who could best deliver them Public Participation and Associational Membership (PP) – involvement in different associations and participation in public and community affairs Household Welfare (HW) – details on household assets and services Final (FI) – enumerator observations

Cities and rural transformation: A spatial analysis of rural youth livelihoods in Ghana

Chapter 7 reflects Ghana’s later stage of development by focusing on the link between urban development and the livelihoods available to rural youth living close to cities or towns.

Ghana: Agricultural growth key to spur Ghana's economic growth

Ghana has been viewed as one of Africa's political and economic success stories, from maintaining a multi-party democracy, peace and social cohesion to reducing poverty and growing its middle class. Yet, despite 30 years of continuous growth in per capita income and rapid urbanization, the country has not been able to industrialize and most of the workforce is either trapped in traditional agriculture or low-productivity jobs in the services sector. Agriculture holds the potential to help bring about more sustainable and equitable patterns of growth, but public and private actors will need to adjust course in order to achieve it.

How can African governments reach poor farmers with fertiliser subsidies? Exploring a targeting approach in Ghana

Ghana’s economic and agricultural transformation: Past performance and future prospects

Ghana’s Economic and Agricultural Transformation: Past Performance and Future Prospects explores the challenges and opportunities of Africa’s transformation through an integrated economic and political analysis. Using Ghana as a case study, a wide range of primary and secondary data used to look at the potential of urbanization, the role of public investments, government support for value chain development, and government commitment to agriculture sector transformation. Agriculture offers real options for transformation, and this book examines the viability of those options given political-economy constraints, past investment decisions, and the broader global environment in which Ghana, and Africa, must now compete.

This record also includes the synopsis:
Diao, Xinshen; Hazell, Peter B.R.; Kolavalli, Shashidhara; and Resnick, Danielle. 2019. Ghana’s economic and agricultural transformation: Past performance and future prospects: Synopsis. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). https://doi.org/10.2499/9780896296862

Introduction [in Ghana’s economic and agricultural transformation]

Why have African economies developed in this way and why has industrialization been so difficult to achieve? And if industrialization is going to be difficult to achieve for African countries, what viable policy options exist to generate sustainable structural transformations in the region? To tackle these important questions in a tractable manner, this book focuses on the experience of one country—Ghana—and examines the country’s overall economic performance since it went through a major Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) in the early 1980s and provides a detailed analysis of the performance of the agricultural sector. In so doing, the book aims to explain why Ghana has not transformed its economy more substantially, why its agriculture sector— beyond cocoa—has not played a greater role, and what it must do in the future if it is to continue with a successful transformation. Addressing these puzzles requires integrating economic and political analyses. Finally, the book considers what the rest of Africa can learn from Ghana’s experience.

Ghana’s agricultural transformation: Past patterns and sources of change

The future sustainability of the current patterns of agricultural growth is constrained by the availability of remaining virgin and fallow land for future expansion of the cropped area. As the land frontier runs out, farmers will need to shift towards more intensive modes of production, and options will need to include higher-yielding technologies and a greater focus on high-value products. The economic viability of these options will depend on government policies towards agricultural R&D, infrastructure, and value chain interventions that condition access to modern inputs and urban markets and their costs, and trade policies that condition the level of competition farmers must face in their domestic markets. These policies will need to be cognizant of the needs of the changing nature of Ghanaian agriculture. As more small farm households are attracted into nonfarm activities, farms become more consolidated, rural wages rise, and rural youth become better educated, more emphasis will be needed on the development of technologies and commercial farming practices that raise land as well as labor productivity, are attractive to young farmers, and meet the needs of Ghana’s increasingly urbanized food system.

Strong democracy, weak state: The political economy of Ghana’s stalled structural transformation

This chapter has shown that Ghana’s reputation for upholding political rights and civil liberties since the country’s democratic transition in 1992 is well deserved. As Africa’s only institutionalized two-party system, competitive elections have enforced a commitment to the poor and a broad swathe of voters, evidenced by an impressive national health insurance scheme and an extensive social transfer program. Resources also have been heavily invested in health and education, resulting in substantial improvements in social outcomes. Foreign direct investment is attracted by the country’s political stability and openness. Compared to the country’s years of political instability prior to the 1980s, when ideological differences resulted in high levels of policy volatility, substantive partisan differences between the NDC and NPP have narrowed on key issues. As Throup et al. (2014: 155) note with respect to agriculture, there is now a bi-partisan consensus on key policies: “the peasantry must be encouraged, nontraditional crops must be promoted, development must be brought to the North [through the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority], and investment on infrastructure should be prioritized.”

Future prospects

This final chapter pulls together the main findings of the book, highlights future challenges and opportunities for Ghana, and provides some guidance on the kinds of strategic changes that might help the country’s efforts towards more sustained structural change. It also concludes with some reflections on what the Ghanaian experience suggests for the rest of Africa.

Agricultural transformation in the savannah: Perspectives from the village

Most of the evidence presented in this book about changes in the agricultural sector draws on secondary data and nationally representative household surveys like the GLSS. This chapter seeks to ground the truth of some of the key findings by providing village and farmer perspectives on important changes that have impacted on their livelihoods since the 1980s, and how they have adapted their farming systems and practices. The chapter also addresses several key questions. What were the key factors driving farmers’ adaptation decisions, including the roles of changes in population density and the availability of additional land for cultivation, improved access to markets, changing market demands, increased competition for labor from the rural nonfarm economy, and higher wages? Why, despite continuing rural population growth, have farmers generally chosen to adopt technologies and farming practices that increase labor productivity relative to land productivity? Finally, what happens once options for bringing more land into production become exhausted?

Public expenditure on agriculture and its impact

This chapter examines past patterns of public spending on agriculture in Ghana, and asks whether Ghana has invested enough resources in agriculture and how the patterns of investment in the sector have impacted agricultural productivity growth.

Unleashing the power of mechanization

As in most of Africa, agricultural mechanization in Ghana has been slow to develop, either in the form of animal or tractor power. But this has changed markedly since the early 2000s, and today about one third of all Ghana’s farmers report using some form of mechanization, mostly tractors for land preparation, as do over half the farmers with five or more hectares of cropped land. However, policymakers often are skeptical of the role played by the private sector in providing mechanization services and worry that supplyside issues may be constraining its uptake, especially amongst smaller-sized farms. With this in mind, the government recently started to directly engage in the importation and subsidization of tractors, and has established a network of subsidized agricultural mechanization service centers around the country (Diao et al. 2014). The government program operates in direct competition with an already established private sector supply system, and this raises a number of important questions. In particular, is the government program overcoming some inherent market failure problems or is it introducing market distortions in machinery prices, encouraging rent-seeking behavior and possibly crowding out more efficient private suppliers? If the latter, then as suggested in Chapter 6, the program may be an unnecessary and costly addition to the financial burden of the public sector.

Urbanization and its impact on Ghana’s rural transformation

The chapter addresses three broad questions. First, are patterns of rural employment in Ghana changing with urbanization and are those changes related in any systematic way with proximity to urban centers of different sizes? Second, does proximity to different-sized urban centers have any impact on patterns of agricultural intensification? Finally, what are the impacts on household livelihoods and welfare outcomes? To answer these questions the analysis goes beyond the usual agroecological breakdown (Chapter 4) and uses a spatial typology of rural areas based on work by Berdegue et al. (2015) and others in Latin America.

Developing agricultural value chains

This chapter examines and compares four important but different types of value chains in Ghana: two export crops—cocoa and pineapples, and two import-substitution crops—rice and tomatoes. Apart from cocoa, these crops have under-exploited opportunities, and we examine the opportunities and constraints along their value chains, and the roles that the public sector has or might need to play. This leads to some more general conclusions about the best ways to develop these and related agricultural value chains in Ghana.

Ghana’s economy-wide transformation: Past patterns and future prospects

Chapter 2 shows that the predominant source of labor productivity growth in Ghana has come from productivity increases within sectors, with the agricultural sector showing a particularly strong performance. Rodrik attributes this source of growth to what he calls “fundamental capabilities,” or the longer-term benefits from investments in better institutions, healthier and better educated workers, technologies, and more enabling policies. Another source of productivity growth arises from the movement of workers from low to higher productivity sectors, (e.g., from traditional agriculture to manufacturing). Rodrik calls this the gains from “structural change,” which result from changes in the relative importance of different sectors in national income and employment.

Labor‐saving technologies and structural transformation in northern Ghana

Labor‐saving technologies played a fundamental role historically in the structural transformation of agrarian economies. We focus on an emerging labor‐saving trend in Ghana, use of motorized tricycles (MTs), which provide an affordable alternative to manually transferring crops from plots to homestead. A household survey collected in 2017 in northern Ghana is used to shed light on how the time savings made available by using MTs may be converted into activities that enhance agricultural productivity and/or diversify the household away from agriculture. Detailed information collected on the agricultural production and agro‐processing behavior of 1,400 households allows us to examine the above transformative channels. Ordinary least squares and instrumental variable regressions are applied to quantify the effect of MTs on related outcomes. We find households are able to diversify their farming activities into selling processed agricultural goods with the time savings provided through MT adoption. Policies aimed to foster the diffusion of MTs elsewhere in Ghana may expedite structural change and, hence, economic growth.

Gender and preferences for non-farm income diversification: A framed field experiment in Ghana

Many rural development programs aim at improving women’s economic empowerment in agriculture, but as rural income continues to diversify, women may prefer investing in nonfarm activities. In a framed field experiment with 1,527 men and women in Ghana, we elicit preferences for investments in crop farming versus other business activities. We analyze whether gender differences in preferences for non-farm diversification, if any, can be ascribed to differential access to physical and human capital, and to what extent a gender gap is explained by differences in socio-economic characteristics, skills, perceptions and norms. Despite strong beliefs that men and women are more skilled in crop farming and non-farm businesses, respectively, many respondents invest in both farm and non-farm activities and we find only a small gender gap in revealed preferences for non-farm diversification. This gap can be largely explained by gender stereotyping around perceived skills. Increasing access to physical and human capital does not significantly affect preferences. We conclude that both men and women reveal a strong preference for diversified investments, which needs to be reflected in programs and policies aiming to improve women’s economic empowerment.

Public agricultural spending and growth in Ghana: Spending more, smarter

In 2014, African heads of state reaffirmed their commitment to the Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Program (CAADP) through the adoption of the Malabo Declaration (AU 2014). The declaration included commitments to reduce hunger and poverty, boost intra-regional trade, enhance resilience to climate variability, and, in line with the Maputo Declaration a decade earlier, to continue allocating to agriculture at least 10 percent of government expenditure. Despite this long-standing spending commitment, Ghana’s agricultural budget share has remained well below 10 percent during the last decade. Depending on accounting principles followed, estimates range from 1 to 2 percent (CAGD 2016), 2 to 4 percent (FAO 2014) or 6 to 8 percent (MoFA 2017a). Given strong evidence that agricultural spending in developing countries yields significant returns (Mogues et al. 2015), Ghana’s relatively weak agricultural performance during the period from 2007 to 2017 may be linked to low levels of spending. At 4.3 percent per annum, agricultural GDP growth has only been half that realized in the non-agricultural sectors (MoF 2018). This weak agricultural growth has also not benefited the poor. Rural poverty has increased in recent years, especially in northern Ghana (GSS 2018). While budgetary allocations to agriculture matter, the quality of spending is as important (Akroyd and Smith 2007). In this regard, concerns have been raised about the decline in allocations to agricultural research, knowledge transfer, and infrastructure in favor of spending on routine operations (FAO 2014; World Bank 2017). Ideally, sector budgets should maintain a healthy balance between investments in a sector’s capacity to grow, e.g., infrastructure or farmers’ knowledge, and expenditures that are fully consumed in the same period, e.g., operational expenses or subsidies (Benin & Tiburcio 2018; Mogues et al. 2015). Following Ghana’s unfavorable assessment in the African Agricultural Transformation Scorecard (AATS), which was launched by the African Union (AU) in 2018, and in light of policy developments, budgetary trends, and socioeconomic outcomes, Ghana’s development partners called for an increase in funding allocated to the agriculture sector at the national Joint Sector Review for Agriculture in June 2019. They further called for improvements in the effectiveness of agricultural spending, with the distortionary effects of large-scale subsidy programs highlighted as a specific concern. A recent study led by IFPRI’s Ghana Strategy Support Program (GSSP) and FAO’s Monitoring and Analyzing Food and Agricultural Policies (MAFAP) project considers these issues further (Aragie et al. 2019). Specifically, using an economywide model of the Ghanaian economy, the research-ers examined how changes in the level and composition of public agricultural expenditure affect socioeconomic outcomes in the short and medium term in Ghana. This note highlights selected key study findings.

Strategic public spending: Scenarios and lessons for Ghana

Growth in Ghana during the last decade has not translated into meaningful benefits for rural households who experienced an increase in poverty in recent years. This reflects, among other factors, the relatively weak performance of the agricultural sector and its general lack of competitiveness. The government has identified agriculture as the backbone of its development strategy and is committed to address the numerous challenges faced by the sector. However, it is likely to encounter fiscal constraints in a postdevelopment assistance era. It is therefore crucial to understand the trade-offs associated with alternative spending strategies. In this study we develop an economywide modeling framework for analyzing returns to public spending in support of agriculture. The model is used to evaluate the effect of compositional shifts in spending given marginal returns to different areas of investment. Our analysis focuses especially on extension services and input subsidies as two important components of the government’s agricultural development strategy. The objective of the study is to advise policymakers on which spending strategy is the most likely to contribute to government’s development goals, such as poverty reduction or economic growth. We find that a doubling of the share of agriculture in total public budget would accelerate agricultural growth to somewhere between 7.6% and 8.6% against the business-as-usual scenario of about 3.5%. The level of growth achieved depends on the types of policies that are favored. In the examples presented here, we show that an input subsidy-oriented spending strategy may yield significant benefits in the short run (1–5 years), and especially in an expansionary fiscal environment, but investments in effective extensive services are more sustainable and rewarding in the medium- to longer-run (6–10 years), especially when public resources are more constrained. These results demonstrate why short-term political goals might result in policy choices that are suboptimal from a longer-term development perspective.

Assessment of flood recession agriculture for food security in northern Ghana: an optimization modelling approach

Food insecurity is a recurrent problem in northern Ghana. Food grown during the rainy season is often insufficient to meet household food needs, with some households experiencing severe food insecurity for up to five months in a year. Flood recession agriculture (FRA) – an agricultural practice that relies on residual soil moisture and nutrients left by receding flood water – is ordinarily practiced by farmers along the floodplains of the White Volta River in northern Ghana under low-input low-output conditions. Opportunities abound to promote highly productive FRA as a means of extending the growing season beyond the short rainy season (from May to September) into the dry season and thereby increase household income and food security of smallholder farmers. This study uses an optimization modelling approach to explore this potential by analyzing the crop mix and agricultural water management options that will maximize household income and enhance food security. Results indicate that growing cowpea, groundnut and melon under residual-moisture based FRA and high value crops (onion, pepper, and tomato) under supplementary irrigation FRA maximize household income and food security. The cash income from the sale of FRA crops was sufficient to purchase food items that ensure consumption smoothing during the food-insecure months. The study concludes that the full potential of FRA will be realized through a careful selection of crop mixtures and by enhancing access of farmers to improved seeds, integrated pest management and credit and mainstreaming FRA through targeted policy interventions and institutional support.

Cities and rural transformation: A spatial analysis of rural livelihoods in Ghana

Recent growth in many African countries has been accompanied by rapid urbanization, which could have major impacts on rural livelihoods. This paper examines patterns of rural livelihoods and poverty in Ghana based on the proximity of rural areas to cities of different sizes. The paper finds that many rural households in the areas close to cities have shifted their primary employment from agriculture to nonagriculture, especially in the more urbanized South. This trend strengthens over time. This appears to take place in contrast to the traditional model of rural livelihood diversification, with some family members working in agriculture and some in nonagriculture. Although cities have created market demand for agriculture, proximity to cities does not seem to influence agricultural intensification in terms of modern input use, possibly due to agricultural markets being relatively integrated in Ghana. Proximity to cities has implications for rural households being less poor and becoming middle class even after controlling for being a nonfarm household in rural areas.

Gender and preferences for non-farm income diversification: A framed field experiment in Ghana

Many rural development programs aim at improving women’s economic empowerment in agriculture, but as rural income continues to diversify, women may prefer investing in nonfarm activities. In a framed field experiment with 1,527 participants in Ghana, we elicit preferences among both men and women for investments in crop farming versus alternative income-generating activities. We analyze gender differences in preferences and whether these can be ascribed to differential access to physical and human capital, or to differences in socio-economic characteristics, skills, perceptions and norms. We find that many respondents prefer to invest in both farm and non-farm activities. Women prefer investing significantly more towards non-farm diversification than men, but the gender gap is much smaller than expected a priori. Differential access to physical and human capital does not appear to explain this gap. Rather, the gender gap is associated with gender stereotyping of perceived skills. We conclude that both men and women reveal a strong preference for a diversity of income-generating activities, which needs to be reflected in programs and policies aiming to improve women’s economic empowerment.

Can local products compete against imports in West Africa? Supply-and demand-side perspectives on chicken, rice, and tilapia in Accra, Ghana

This paper examines the prospects for import substitution in West Africa by analyzing the preferences of urban consumers for food product attributes. We use market surveys, choice experiments, and experimental auctions to assess price and quality competitiveness of locally-produced chicken, rice, and tilapia in Accra, Ghana. For the price analysis, we compare market prices of imported and local counterparts, and we compare the local costs of production to production costs in major exporting countries. For the quality analysis, we compare consumer perceptions and demand for quality attributes of local versus imported products using data from field experiments with 1,322 consumers. Our findings suggest that among the three products, rice has the lowest prospects for import substitution, due to supply-and demand-side constraints to local competitiveness. For rice, consumers prefer imported products, they perceive imports as having better quality than local products, and they are willing to pay a premium for imports. For chicken, consumers have a strong preference for local products, but the potential for expanding chicken production can only be met if production and processing costs can be reduced significantly to boost price competitiveness. For tilapia, a high preference for freshness provides a natural barrier to import entry, and the comparative advantage of local production can be enhanced by making continuous improvements in seed and extension systems, industry coordination, certification, and regulation.

What if mothers are entrepreneurs? Non-farm businesses and child schooling in rural Ghana

Consumer demand and willingness to pay for safe food in Accra, Ghana: Implications for public and private sectors’ roles in food safety management

Consumer demand for food safety is likely to be an important driver of public policies and industry-led efforts to reduce information asymmetry on food attributes and improved food safety. This paper examines the attribute demand for chicken meat and tilapia among 803 shoppers in Accra, Ghana. Freshness is the main attribute demanded by the overwhelming majority of shoppers, followed by food safety, price, taste and size. Consumers are willing to pay price premiums for food safety certifications, i.e., those certified according to Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) principles or certified as free of antibiotic residue. However, the price premium shoppers are willing to pay for improved food safety vary by shoppers type. A third of tilapia shoppers and half of chicken meat shoppers are classified as food safety conscious shoppers and willing to pay a 10 to 12 percent higher price than noncertified products. In comparison, only a tenth of shoppers are considered to be price conscious and willing to pay a small premium (< 1 percent) for certified safe foods. We also tested an information treatment on the negative health implications of food contamination and its effect on shoppers’ decisions. The information treatment randomly assigned to shoppers was a significant predictor of food safety attribute demand for chicken meat but not for tilapia, which may be linked to greater awareness of and concern about antibiotic misuse in poultry production. Our findings generally point to a concern about food safety and a strong demand and willingness among consumers to pay premiums for certified safe foods, thus providing support for public- or industry-led schemes to provide food safety information to consumers.

Land consolidation, specialization and household diets: Evidence from Rwanda

Measures and Determinants of Urban Food Security: Evidence from Accra, Ghana

The urban population in Africa south of the Sahara (SSA) is expected to expand rapidly from 376 million people in 2015 to more than 1.25 billion people by 2050. Measuring and ensuring food security among urban households will become an increasingly pertinent task for development researchers and practitioners. In this paper we characterize food security among a sample of low- and middle-income residents of Accra, Ghana, using 2017 survey data. We find that households tend to purchase food from traditional markets, local stalls and kiosks, and street hawkers, and rarely from modern supermarkets. We characterize food security using three established metrics: the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS); the Household Food Insecurity Access Prevalence (HFIAP); and the Food Consumption Score (FCS). We then estimate the determinants of food security using general linear models. The food security metrics are not strongly correlated. For example, according to HFIAP, as many as 70 percent of households sampled are food insecure, but only 2 percent fall below acceptable thresholds measured by FCS. Model results show that household education, assets, and dwelling characteristics are significantly associated with food security according to HFIAS and HFIAP, but not with FCS. The poor correlation and weak model agreement between the dietary recall metric, FCS, and the experience-based metrics, HFIAS and HFIAP, call for closer attention to measurement of urban food security. Given Africa’s urban future, our findings highlight the need for an urban-oriented comprehensive approach to the food security of urban households.

Determinants of firm exit and growth in the food processing sector: Evidence from Ghana

We explore the determinants of firm exit and growth in the food processing sector using nationally representative data for 745 firms in Ghana. In our sample, 168 of the firms exited the sector during the period 2014-2017. Firms were more likely to exit if they were in a rural district, were younger, and were involved in grain milling, but there was little impact of firm size on the likelihood of exit. In terms of firm growth, we find that tax registration, combined with registration with the national food regulator, had positive impacts on firm growth, while tax registration alone has a weaker effect. Therefore, for the food processing sector, efforts to promote formalization of firms for tax purposes would yield greater benefits if firms are also encouraged to undergo regulatory inspections and certification.

Changing gender roles in agriculture? Evidence from 20 years of data in Ghana

Many stylized facts about women in agriculture have been repeated for decades. Did nothing really change? Is some of this conventional wisdom simply maintained over time, or has it always been inaccurate? We use four rounds of cross‐sectional data from Ghana to assess some of the facts and to evaluate whether gender patterns have changed over time. We focus on five main themes: land, cropping patterns, market participation, agricultural inputs, and employment. We add to the literature by showing new facts and evidence for more than 20 years. Results show that stylized facts do not always hold, and that some of these “facts” change over time. We find significant variation in the extent of (changes in) gender discrepancies across themes, different agro‐ecological zones, ethnicities, household types, and women's role in the household.

Firm employment, exit, and growth in the food processing sector: Evidence from Ghana

This paper uses data from a sample of 679 food processing firms in Ghana to estimate changes in employment by the food processing sector from 2014 to 2017, to analyze the determinants of firm exit during the same period, and to analyze the determinants of firm growth from the firm’s establishment up to 2017. In modeling the determinants of firm growth, the focus is on the effects of formal status as a food processing firm, which is defined in this paper as registration as a business for tax purposes and registration with the national food regulator, the Food and Drugs Authority (FDA).

The transformation of urban food systems in Ghana: Findings from inventories of processed products

Urban food systems in Ghana are changing, along with rapid urbanization and growth in household incomes. Using data from retail inventories of packaged products carried out in eight cities in 2015 and 2016, we find that the interplay of urbanization, imports and domestic processing and packaging has led to some surprising outcomes. Imports are dominant, especially for milled rice and tomato paste, and the shares are higher in smaller cities than in Accra. Imported products are more prevalent in traditional retail outlets than in modern retail outlets. Moreover, imported products come mainly from East Asia; excluding South Africa, which accounts for 6% of imports, less than 3% of imported products were from other African countries.

A blue revolution in sub-Saharan Africa? Evidence from Ghana’s tilapia value chain

Global growth in aquaculture is underway – a “blue revolution” featuring rapid increases in demand for fish and a corresponding surge in aquaculture production. This paper describes the fast-growing tilapia value chain in Ghana to demonstrate the features of a nascent blue revolution in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and to illustrate its potential for job creation and reducing poverty and food insecurity there. Tilapia production has been growing at 15 percent annually in SSA, but imports are also surging to satisfy the growing appetite for tilapia. This paper illustrates how aquaculture can grow sustainably in SSA within the context of growing demand and global competition. A value chain analysis is conducted using secondary data analysis, desk reviews of experiences and lessons from other countries, interviews with 95 actors in the tilapia value chain in Ghana, and detailed production and profitability data from Ghanaian tilapia farmers. A profitable farmed tilapia industry has been established in Ghana with the potential to expand supply to satisfy local demand and to export to neighboring countries. Productivity in the industry has grown mainly through reducing the mortality rates of fingerlings and improvements in the supply of locally-produced high-quality fish feed. Feed costs remain high. However, there is potential to reduce those costs by improving the productivity of crops that are used in fish feed, particularly maize and soybean. Reducing local feed costs will have positive spillover effects on both other pond-based aquaculture systems and on the livestock feed sector. Moreover, Ghana can expand it fish feed production to be an important source of feed within SSA. The industry can further increase aquaculture productivity through the adoption of faster-growing fish strains and better management practices. Ghana’s aquaculture sector could grow even faster by adopting lessons from other countries, including on infrastructure provision, fiscal incentives for the production of fish feed ingredients, and sustainable fish farming practices, particularly through paying close attention to water and feed quality and addressing food safety concerns within the sector.

Land consolidation, specialization, and household diets: Evidence from Rwanda

Despite rapid population growth, increasing land pressure and urbanization, farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa have not intensified their production in a sustainable manner and farming systems remain predominantly subsistence-oriented. Unsurprisingly, developing countries are directing large shares of their agricultural budgets to programs that actively promote crop intensification and the development of more commercially-oriented agricultural systems. Rwanda’s Crop Intensification Program (CIP), launched in 2007, is one such example. However, despite its apparent success in raising production of several priority crops, there are legitimate concerns about the food and nutrition security implications for households that are encouraged to consolidate their land, specialize in their production, and increasingly rely on markets for their food needs. Using recent household survey data and a propensity score matching difference-in-differences method, we find that participation in land consolidation activities had ambiguous consumption effects: it positively impacted on consumption of roots and tubers, but had a negative effect on meat, fish and fruits consumption and the potential availability of vitamin B12 in participants’ diets. This calls for a review of CIP implementation practices to enhance the program’s food and nutrition security outcomes, with improvements in market functioning and market access being potential starting points.

Assessing quality attributes that drive preference and consumption of local rice in Ghana

Rice consumption in Ghana has more than quadrupled in the last 60 years, becoming a common staple food. However, this increasing demand is being met by imports. The rise in rice imports has led to a renewed interest in promoting domestic production of rice to substitute for imported rice. However, it is not clear how current rice development policies are informed by the preferences of consumers for specific quality attributes of rice. This study assesses the preferred rice qualities that drive consumption of local rice in Ghana. Through a review of previous studies on consumer preferences of rice complemented with information collected through interviews with local rice traders, millers, and other stakeholders, this paper describes the types of rice and their sources, the types of rice consumers, and the packaging and quality attributes of local rice in key markets in Ghana. We find that the quality of branded local rice types has improved in recent years. However, unbranded local rice in Ghana is still commonly contaminated with foreign materials, is made up of co-mingled varieties, and has a large share of broken and yellowish grain. In addition, local rice continues to be sold at a lower price than imported rice of same quality. This is largely due to the perceived low quality of local rice by consumers that results in low demand. Marketing campaigns and sensitization to advocate for consumption of local rice are recommended policy options to increase consumer awareness and to build demand for quality local rice in Ghana.

Building evidence for policy and program action for nutrition in Ghana

This brief provides an overview of existing literature on nutrition in Ghana, summarizing the issues covered by existing evidence and identifying remaining evidence gaps. It also describes promising new research initiatives underway to further build the evidence base for nutrition action in Ghana.

Effects of tractor ownership on returns-to-scale in agriculture: Evidence from maize in Ghana

Ghana Strategy Support Program (GSSP)

Since 2010, when the country reached lower-middle-income status, Ghana’s economic performance has been highly variable. Growth was rapid from 2011 to 2013—largely due to strong performance in the oil and gas sector—as the economy expanded by more than 10 percent annually, but slumped to 3.8 percent from 2014 to 2016. In 2017, growth picked up to 6.3 percent and is expected to be among the highest in Africa in 2018, at a projected 8.3 percent. The agriculture and natural resource sectors account for 41.5 percent of employment and nearly a third of gross domestic product (GDP). Labor is moving out of agriculture, but predominantly into low-productivity services sectors rather than into high-productivity manufacturing. Average agricultural growth hovered around 5 percent from 2014 to 2017. To increase productivity and boost economic growth, Ghana must continue to invest in agriculture and, to promote transformation, should facilitate the development of agro-industries to diversify agriculture. Ghana’s inconsistent growth performance warrants a fresh look at rigorous research to inform the country’s development strategy. The Ghana Strategy Support Program (GSSP), implemented by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) mission in Ghana, was launched in 2005 and is currently in its third phase (2014–2018). overall objective of IFPRI/GSSP is to conduct research and advise on strategic policy options to support agricultural growth, rural development, and economic transformation in Ghana.

Competitiveness of the Ghanaian vegetable sector: Findings from a farmer survey

This study looks broadly at the state of vegetable competitiveness in Ghana; focusing on trade, production, profitability, and marketing. Ghana is dependent on imports to meet its vegetable consumption requirements. While Ghana has the potential to meet local vegetable demand because of its diverse agro-ecological zones, currently production is highly seasonal and yields are significantly lower than in neighboring countries. Large urban markets are restricted by networks of traders and, while farmers can get higher prices through these networks, many farmers lack market power and struggle to access the marketing networks. This may lower incentives for vegetable farmers to increase their production. However, despite these challenges, vegetable production is profitable and there is potential for significant expansion. Strategies to improve yields as well as measures to remove restrictions on entry to major markets should be considered.

What are the impacts of devolution on agricultural civil servants and services in Ghana?

In 2009, Ghana passed Local Government Instrument 1961 (LI 1961) to devolve a set of functions from the central government to the country’s 216 Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDA). Agriculture, along with public works and social welfare, was among the first sectors to be devolved. This transfer was formally institutionalized in 2012. In addition, LI 1961 stipulated that the staff of the MMDA departments were to be transferred from the national civil service to a newly created Local Government Services (LGS). A composite budget system also was introduced, which integrated the budgets of all departments of the MMDAs into the overall budget for the MMDA.

The devolution revolution: Implications for agricultural service delivery in Ghana

In 2009, Ghana began pursuing the devolution of functions and responsibilities from the central government to the country’s 216 Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs). Agriculture was among one of the first sectors to be devolved, a process that became effective in 2012. This paper analyzes how this transition has proceeded, with a focus on the implications for agricultural civil servants within the MMDAs, accountability to citizens, and agricultural expenditures. Empirically, the paper draws on a survey of 960 rural households, 80 District Directors of Agriculture (DDAs), district level budget data from 2012 to 2016, and semi-structured interviews with a range of national and local government stakeholders.

Performance and adoption factors for open pollinated and hybrid maize varieties: Evidence from farmers’ fields in northern Ghana

Maize is the most widely grown starch in Ghana, and yet domestic supply does not meet demand, because maize productivity is low. Trials were performed in northern Ghana in 2015 to determine whether hybrid varieties would outperform the varieties planted by farmers and, therefore, increase maize productivity. Two foreign hybrids performed consistently better then Obaatanpa, the most widely used variety in the north. In 2016, Adikanfo, the best performing hybrid, and certified Obaatanpa were made available for purchase at subsidized rates in the communities where the 2015 trials had been conducted. A survey was then carried out to study whether the trials had any effect on technology uptake or behavioral change among farmers in the region and if the varieties performed as well on the farmers’ fields as in the trials. This paper presents the descriptive results of the survey.

Agronomic performance of open pollinated and hybrid maize varieties: Results from on-farm trials in northern Ghana

Maize is an important staple crop in Ghana, but maize productivity is low. Other countries with similar agroecological conditions have increased maize productivity by increasing the use of maize hybrids. This paper presents the results of maize trials in northern Ghana, in which hybrids were tested to see if they performed significantly better than the varieties planted by farmers. This paper details the procedures of the maize trials and presents descriptive statistics of the trial results. The trials demonstrated that two foreign hybrids performed consistently better than Obaatanpa, the most widely used variety in the north. The foreign hybrids performed consistently well in all districts and appear to be well-suited for planting in northern Ghana.

Does warehouse receipt financing benefit Ghanaian smallholders?

In practice, however, warehouse receipt financing has generally failed to deliver the benefits to smallholders hoped for by development economists and practitioners. In Ghana, and more generally throughout Africa, warehouse receipt financing is currently used almost exclusively by large traders, processors, and exporters. In this brief, we explore reasons why smallholders have shunned warehouse receipt financing and discuss policy prescriptions that could make warehouse receipt financing more accessible and beneficial to them.

Mothers’ non-farm entrepreneurship and child secondary education in rural Ghana

In this paper we empirically analyse the impact of mothers’ non-farm entrepreneurship on child secondary school enrollment in rural Ghana. We use nationally representative quantitative data from the sixth round of the Ghana Living Standard Survey (GLSS) and qualitative data from focus group discussions throughout rural Ghana. We apply instrumental variable estimation techniques with instruments that pass weak and overidentification tests. We test interaction effects between mothers’ non-farm entrepreneurship and other important determinants of child schooling. We use qualitative data to support our quantitative findings.

Limitations of contract farming as a pro-poor strategy: The case of maize outgrower schemes in Upper West Ghana

The focus in this paper is on different maize-based CF schemes in the poorest and most remote region in Ghana. It assesses the profitability and potential impact of these CF schemes, utilizing a unique plot-level dataset that covers two periods of data and two maize plots (scheme and non-scheme) per household, and employing matching techniques and an instrumental variable approach to address selection bias and unobserved heterogeneity across farmers. These are complemented by a community-level survey, in-depth interviews with scheme operators, and a series of key informant interviews. Results show that these schemes led to improved technology adoption and yield increases. In addition, a subset of maize farmers with high yield improvements due to CF participation have high profits. Maize CF schemes also enabled market coordination and consistent supply of quality maize to downstream industries. However, on average, the impact of the CF schemes on profitability is negative, even when input diversion is accounted for. Yield increases are not high enough to compensate for higher input requirements and the cost of capital under the schemes. Despite higher yields, the costs to produce one metric tonne of maize under CF schemes are higher than on maize farms without CF schemes, twice that of several countries in Africa, and more than seven times higher than that of major maize-exporting countries (the United States, Brazil, and Argentina). Sustainability of these CF schemes will largely depend on developing and promoting much-improved varieties and technologies that boost yields in order to compensate for the high input and credit costs.

Do development projects crowd-out private sector activities? Evidence from contract farming participation in Northern Ghana

The cocoa coast: The board-managed cocoa sector in Ghana

After almost 20 years of declining cocoa production, Ghana has been able in the last decade to increase the share of export prices going to producers and more than double production. Contrary to Washington Consensus prescriptions, these accomplishments were achieved through reforms that did not include market liberalization. In The Cocoa Coast: The Board-Managed Cocoa Sector in Ghana, the authors identify factors that have contributed to Ghana’s success in cocoa production. These include the accountability of the government for the sector’s performance (cocoa-sector performance being seen as a key dimension of economic management), its interest in maintaining the ability to raise funds globally as a reliable supplier of high-quality cocoa, and its policy of retaining a portion of producer revenues to promote the adoption of yield-enhancing measures. The authors also suggest how Ghana can improve the efficiency of the cocoa sector through measures such as increased transparency and curtailing services that would be better provided by the private sector. The Cocoa Coast will be a valuable resource for policy makers, development specialists, and others interested in different national development paths.

This record also includes the synopsis: Kolavalli, Shashidhara; and Vigneri, Marcella. 2017. The cocoa coast: The board-managed cocoa sector in Ghana: Synopsis. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. https://doi.org/10.2499/9780896292703

Democracy, decentralization, and district proliferation: The case of Ghana

Agricultural mechanization in Africa: Insights from Ghana’s experience

This brief explores recent developments in Ghana that lend insight into the drivers of mechanization and the appropriate role of government policy in supporting this transition.

A spatial analysis of youth livelihoods and rural transformation in Ghana

Ghana’s population is becoming younger and increasingly urbanized – by 2010, over half the population lived in urban settlements of more than 5,000 people – raising concerns among policy makers regarding the location and types of jobs required to employ the youth. The slow creation of for-mal urban jobs has particularly strong implications for young people entering the labor force: they are more educated than the older generation, with greater aspirations for non-farm employment and urban lifestyles (Anyidoho, Leavy, and Asenso-Okyere 2012). Without rapid industrialization to create more formal manufacturing and other non-agricultural jobs, youth in Ghana who leave the agricultural sector are increasingly likely to resort to informal services in both rural and urban areas. While much youth-related research has focused on changes in youth employment and livelihoods through rural-urban migration, a re-cent IFPRI Discussion Paper focuses on youth in the rural non-farm economy (Diao et al. 2017).

Cities and rural transformation: A spatial analysis of rural youth livelihoods in Ghana

Urbanization has had a major impact on livelihoods in Ghana and throughout Africa as a whole. However, much research on urbanization has focused on effects occurring within cities, while there is insufficient understanding of its effects on rural areas. This paper examines the impact of urbanization—through a typology of districts—on rural livelihoods in Ghana. The country’s districts are classified into seven spatial groups according to the size of the largest city in each district in southern and northern Ghana. The paper does not address rural–urban migration but instead focuses on the livelihoods of rural households. In contrast to the extensive literature focusing on the effects of urbanization on individuals, we assess its impacts on individual rural households as a whole, with a particular focus on youth-headed households. Many rural households have shifted their primary employment from agriculture to nonagriculture, especially in the more urbanized South. In contrast, change in livelihood diversification within rural households with family members’ primary employment in both agriculture and nonagriculture appears much less rapid. Rural youth-headed households are significantly more associated with the transition away from agriculture than households headed by other adults, and such trends are stronger in locations closer to larger cities, particularly in the South. Although the nonagricultural economy is becoming increasingly important for rural households, contrary to expectations, the probit model analysis in this paper shows that agricultural production does not appear to be more intensified—in terms of modern input use—in the more urbanized South, and youth do not show greater agricultural technology adoption than other adults, indicating that the constraints against modern input adoption may be binding for all farmers, including youth and farmers in more urbanized locations. We also find that rural poverty rates are consistently lower among nonagricultural households, and the share of middle-class population is also disproportionally higher among rural nonagricultural households than agricultural households. While the probit analysis confirms the positive relationship between being a nonagricultural household and being nonpoor or becoming middle class after controlling for all other factors, education seems to play the biggest role. As rural youth become more educated and more households shift from agriculture to the rural nonfarm economy, a different range of technologies for agricultural intensification is necessary for agriculture to be attractive for youth. A territorial approach and related policies that integrate secondary cities and small towns with the rural economy deserve more attention such that the diversification of rural livelihoods can become a viable alternative or complement to rural–urban migration for youth.

Limitations of contract farming as a pro-poor strategy: The case of maize outgrower schemes in upper West Ghana

The focus in this paper is on two relatively large maize-based contract farming (CF) schemes with fixed input packages (Masara and Akate) and a number of smaller and more flexible CF schemes in a remote region in Ghana (Upper West). Results show that these schemes led to improved technology adoption and yield increases. In addition, a subset of maize farmers with high yield improvements due to CF participation had high gross margins. However, on average, yields were not high enough to compensate for higher input requirements and cost of capital. On average, households harvest 29–30 bags (100 kg each), or 2.9–3.0 metric tons, of maize per hectare, and the required repayment for fertilizer, seed, herbicide, and materials provided under the average CF scheme is 21–25 bags (50 kg each) per acre, or 2.6–3.0 tons per hectare, which leaves almost none for home consumption or for sale. Despite higher yields, the costs to produce 1 ton of maize under CF schemes remain high on average—higher than on maize farms without CF schemes, more than twice that of several countries in Africa, and more than seven times higher than that of major maize-exporting countries (the United States, Brazil, and Argentina). Sustainability of these CF schemes will depend on, from the firms’ perspective, minimizing the costs to run and monitor them, and from the farmers’ perspective, developing and promoting much-improved varieties and technologies that may lead to a jump in yields and gross margins to compensate for the high cost of credit.

Observing Ghana’s food system transformation through an assessment of processed food retail in four major cities

This paper describes key features of processed food retail within the context of food system transformation in Ghana—the spread of supermarkets, the sources of processed food products, and the use of traditional and modern retail outlets as marketing channels. The data come from retail inventories of packaged products— poultry meat and eggs, processed tomatoes, and milled grains, roots, and tubers— in four major cities. We find that the interplay of urbanization, imports, and domestic processing and packaging has led to some surprising outcomes. Imports are dominant, as expected, especially for products such as milled rice and tomato paste. Yet, remarkably, import shares are lower (63 percent) in Accra, the principal city, compared to more than 70 percent in three smaller cities, and imported products have higher shares in traditional retail outlets than in modern retail outlets.

Changing gender roles in agriculture? Evidence from 20 years of data in Ghana

At a time when donors and governments are increasing efforts to mainstream gender in agriculture, it is critical to revisit long-standing wisdom about gender inequalities in agriculture to be able to more efficiently design and evaluate policy interventions. Many stylized facts about women in agriculture have been repeated for decades. Did nothing really change? Is some of this conventional wisdom simply maintained over time, or has it always been inaccurate? We use longitudinal data from Ghana to assess some of the facts and to evaluate whether gender patterns have changed over time. We focus on five main themes: land, cropping patterns, market participation, agricultural inputs, and employment. We add to the literature by showing new facts and evidence from more than 20 years. Results are varied and highlight the difficulty of making general statements about gender in agriculture.

Effects of tractor ownership on agricultural returns-to-scale in household maize production: Evidence from Ghana

The rise in returns-to-scale (RTS) has often been an integral part of the agricultural transformation process around the world. Although tractor ownership is often associated with greater RTS in agriculture, whether tractor ownership actually causes such increase in RTS has not been formally tested in the literature. We provide evidence that partly bridges this knowledge gap, using unique survey data of tractor-owning farm households in Ghana. We find that owning tractors significantly increases RTS in maize production from the households’ largest monocropped plot. Specifically, owning tractors raises RTS for farmers because they can till greater areas, even though returns from tilling more land remain relatively unaffected. The increase in RTS holds regardless of the values of tractors owned. These sets of evidence are obtained by addressing jointly the multiple sources of endogeneity of tractor ownership, tractor values, tillage intensity, and other inputs used, through combinations of inverse-probability weighing method, generalized method of moments method, and the mediation effects model with multiple mediators. The adoptions of mechanical technologies (tractors) and their ownerships are causing, rather than simply responding to, the rise in RTS in Ghanaian maize production.

Growth of modern service providers for the African agricultural sector: An insight from a public irrigation scheme in Ghana

This paper describes how modern service providers have emerged in the African agricultural sector, a subject that has been vastly understudied. The paper looks at providers of modern rice mills, power tillers, combine harvesters, and production services at a highly productive rice irrigation scheme in Ghana. These service providers earn net profits that are greater than the profits they would likely achieve from simply expanding rice production without investing in respective machines, suggesting that higher returns primarily induce the emergence of these modern providers. Surpluses and experiences from their years of rice production are likely to have provided the primary finance and knowledge required for entry. The service providers emerged by exploiting both the economies of scale and the economies of scope, keeping rice production as the primary source of income, instead of specializing only in service provisions. Key policy implications are also discussed.

A chicken and maize situation: The poultry feed sector in Ghana

This study focuses on the feed milling industry, which serves as the link between maize and poultry, through a field assessment of feed millers in Ghana. The findings establish the importance of feed in the poultry value chain. In addition, they show how the sector has become more integrated with poultry production, especially on larger-scale poultry farms. Because maize accounts for 60 percent of poultry feed, its availability and price have important implications for the profitability and growth potential of feed and, therefore, for poultry production as well. We illustrate these linkages by means of a simple spatial market equilibrium model that ties together the three sectors of the poultry value chain: the primary inputs (maize and soybeans), intermediate inputs (feed), and final products (meat and eggs). This model also enables us to assess the future growth potential of the poultry industry given alternative policy-driven changes in productivity and the production capacities of all three sectors. The results show that for poultry meat, replacing imports with domestic production in the short term would be nearly impossible. For the egg industry, however, there is potential for Ghana to export to neighboring countries by reducing production costs through improvements in yellow maize production.