Book Chapters
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Book Chapters: A scholarly introduction of chapter length to an edited volume, where the content of the introduction reports research and makes a substantial contribution to a defined area of knowledge.
On the other hand, Review books or articles provide a critical and constructive analysis of existing published literature in a field, through summary, analysis, and comparison, often identifying specific gaps or problems and providing recommendations for future research. These are considered as secondary literature since they generally do not present new data from the author's experimental work. Review articles can be of three types, broadly speaking: literature reviews, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses.
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Item Microfinance With Education In Rural Ghana: Men’s Perception Of Household Level Impact(African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development, 2012) Hagan, L.L.; Aryeetey, R.; Colecraft, E.K.; et al.Microcredit schemes have been shown to enhance women’s Income Generation Activities (IGA), household food security, and child nutrition. However, spouses or Male Household Heads (MHH) can influence how women’s loans are invested and how incomes ensuing from the investments are expended. This study describes how MHH perceived and experienced the participation of female caregivers from their household in the Enhancing Child Nutrition through Animal Source Food Management (ENAM) project. The ENAM project was designed as an integrated intervention providing microcredit, entrepreneurship, and nutrition education to women in rural communities in Ghana. Eighty-five MHH of ENAM project caregivers in two regions of Ghana were interviewed about their awareness of the microcredit and education intervention, their involvement in the IGA that the caregivers’ loans were invested in, and their perceptions of the impact of the project on the caregivers’ IGA as well as household and child nutrition. The majority of MHH indicated that they had been consulted by the caregivers about the decision to participate in the ENAM project. The most common reasons given for consenting to the caregivers’ decision to participate in the program were expectations that the caregiver would receive business capital (30.6%), education on optimal child feeding (36.5%), and income to enable caregivers to contribute more to household expenses (31.8%). Concerning the project’s impact, MHH perceived that the caregivers’ project participation had a positive impact on their business practices, particularly concerning improved customer relations. The MHH perceived that caregivers’ incomes increased because they participated in ENAM as evidenced by regular income savings and increased contributions to household food and non-food expenditures. However, MHH reported decreases in their contributions to almost all household expenditure categories in response to the perceived increase in caregivers’ incomes. The MHH also perceived improvements in home meal quality. In summary, MHH credited the ENAM project with improved caregiver’s incomes and increased share of household expenses. However, this outcome resulted in unanticipated declines in MHH contribution to household expenses. Further studies are needed to understand the impact of empowering women through social experiments on households.Item The Effect of Aid on Growth in the Presence of Economic Regime Change(African Finance Journal, 2019) Samanhyia, S.; Cassimon, D.The empirical literature on aid effectiveness is mired in controversy. In this regard, the paper aims to investigate the effect of aid on economic growth in Ghana. Using Auto-Regressive Distributed Lagged Models as the main estimation strategy, the study concludes that aid has a positive and statistically significant effect on economic growth. The effect of aid on economic growth is more pronounced taking into account the marginal effect of a shift in economic policy from a controlled economic regime to an open market system. The result is robust when the data is triangulated with other estimation methods. Following the key findings, the study recommends that government pursues economic policies that promote more private-sector participation. Also, alternative financing that focuses on the domestic market should be encouraged to avoid the negative impact of dwindling aid inflows.Item Migrants in Countries in Crisis: The Experiences of Ghanaian and Nigerien Migrants during the Libyan Crisis of 2011(African Human Mobility Review, 2019) Kandilige, L.; Hamidou, M.N.Using the experiences of Ghanaian and Nigerian migrants who were implicated in the 2011 Libyan crisis as a case study, this paper highlights the importance of examining micro-level factors in explaining migration decision-making processes. It therefore challenges the uncritical use of macro-level factors as exogenous ‘root causes’ of migration especially in developing country contexts. Adopting mainly qualitative approaches among seventy-five key informants from six distinct categories, the study finds that migration culture, household livelihood aspirations, geographical propinquity, the existence of social networks and migrant smuggling rings motivate migrations to Libya. The paper also challenges scholarship on the 2011 Libyan crisis that treats the experiences of sub-Saharan African (SSA) migrants in the country as an undifferentiated group. The paper concludes that within a developing country context, the political economy of the origin country contributes to the establishment, over time, of a migration culture especially among youth who feel trapped in ‘waithood’ and are unable to realize basic socio-cultural and economic markers in life. The paper recommends the regionalization of evacuation and repatriation programs to facilitate the timely extraction of trapped migrants from countries in crisis.Item Generational Perspective of Digital Literacy Among Ghanaians in the 21st Century: Wither Now?(Medijske Studije, 2019) Dovie, D.A.; Dzorgbo, D.B.S.; Mate-Kole, C.C.; et al.This paper investigates the nexus between generations and digital literacy. For the study, simple random sampling was undertaken in selecting 361 respondents, while 10 participants were selected through purposive sampling. The authors made use of mixed methods, including the interview survey method. The data were subjected to bivariate, correlation, and thematic analysis. Concerning the results, younger people turn out to be comparatively more digitally active and more digitally skilled than older people, which is indicative of the fact that there is a generational gap between the two distinct generations in terms of being in a technologically savvy position. This was influenced significantly by the era in which they were born, as each generation comes with its technological innovations, the phenomena of socialization, and social interaction with self-organization as the focus. It is concluded that digital literacy, expositions, and exploits are significant in how they shape generational interactions, including the adaptation to digital device utilization in later life.Item Vegetable production technical efficiency and technology gaps in Ghana(African Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 2019) Tsiboe, F.; Asravor, J.; Osei, E.This study characterizes the nature of the vegetable production shortfall throughout Ghana for remedial action to be taken. By applying the meta-stochastic frontier analysis to a sample of okra, pepper, and tomato farmers, the results show that the ranking of production inputs in production is in the order of the land, hired labor, fertilizer, pesticide, and family labor. Furthermore, the results also suggest that vegetable production is characterized by diseconomies of scale. Technical efficiency for okra, pepper, and tomato farmers in Ghana is estimated at 54%, 74%, and 58% respectively, and this has generally increased for okra and pepper but remained stable for tomato. Technology gaps are close to non-existent for pepper cultivation, modest for tomato, and severe for okra. This implies that, whilst there is no potential for production gain from redistributing pepper technology throughout Ghana, there is limited potential for tomato and substantial potential for okra. Pepper farmers could potentially benefit from managerial improvements.Item Access Barriers Encountered By Persons With Mobility Disabilities In Accra, Ghana(Journal of Social Inclusion, 2019) Naami, A.The environment is a critical factor for participation for everyone. The need for accessible transportation and a built environment for persons with disabilities to enjoy their basic human rights and fundamental freedoms cannot be overemphasized. This study sought to understand the daily experiences of persons with mobility disabilities with physical and transportation barriers in Accra-Ghana. Photovoice methodology was used to enable participants to tell their stories about access barriers that they encountered daily. A total of 153 pictures remained, out of 431, after the final selection of pictures that best communicated participants’ experiences with accessibility. These pictures were accompanied by 95 narratives corresponding to the content of the pictures as well as the messages that the participants sought to communicate. The pictures were taken from 11 different physical and transportation environments. Evidence from the study demonstrates the existence of barriers in the built environment and transportation, which impact negatively on the psychological and social lives of persons with mobility disabilities. The need for the removal of identified barriers to empowering persons with disabilities for sustainable development cannot be overemphasized. The paper, therefore, concludes with recommendations targeting the government, social workers, and disability activists about strategies to improve access to participation for persons with mobility disabilities.Item Navigating the Unknown Treasures of Guangzhou, China: Ghanaian Traders’ Networks and Strategies(African Human Mobility Review, 2019) Obeng, M.K.M.Using multiple ethnographic methodologies spanning 13 months and collecting data across borders, this paper suggests that African importers’ participation in the burgeoning economy of China is more nuanced than previously reported. It argues that approaches, motives, and strategies employed by these importers are subject to their trading capacities such as the size of capital, trading experiences, and locations of their imports. For instance, whereas experienced large-scale traders procure the services of ‘visa agents’ for convenient purposes, the small-scale traders need the ‘visa agents’ to be able to undertake their business in China.Item How Does Leader’s Support for Environment Promote Organizational Citizenship Behaviour for Environment? A Multi-Theory Perspective(Sustainability, 2018) Priyankara, H.P.R.; Nubuor, S.A.; Luo, F.; et al.Organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment of employees is indispensable in realizing the environmental sustainability goals of organizations. However, in the growing literature on employee green behaviour at work, scant attention has been paid to the impact of a leader’s specific support for the environment, and the mechanisms through which it impacts organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment. Drawing upon social exchange theory, self-determination theory and theory of normative conduct, we tested the impact of a leader’s support for the environment, autonomous motivation for the environment and perceived group’s green climate on organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment in an integrated model. The sample included 313 executive-level employees of green-implemented textile and apparel manufacturing factories in Sri Lanka. The results of structural equation modelling showed a direct positive impact of a leader’s support for the environment on organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment. Further, autonomous motivation for the environment and the perceived group’s green climate were found to be partial mediators between the leader’s support for the environment and organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment. We discussed the theoretical implications for sustainability literature and the managerial implications for organizational practitioners in promoting organizational citizenship behaviour for the environment.Item Identifying Ecosystem-Based Alternatives for the Design of a Seaport’s Marine Infrastructure: The Case of Tema Port Expansion in Ghana(Sustainability, 2019) Boer, W.P.; Addo, K.A.; Slinger, J.H.; et al.Long-term sustainable port development requires accounting for the intrinsic values of ecosystems. However, in practice, ecosystem considerations often only enter the planning and design process of ports when required by an Environmental Impact Assessment. At this late stage, most of the design is already fixed and opportunities to minimize and restore ecosystem impacts are limited. In this paper, we adopt a large-scale, ecosystem perspective on port development with the aim to identify ecosystem-based design alternatives earlier and throughout the planning and design of a port’s marine infrastructure. We present a framework, termed the ‘ecosystem-based port design hierarchy’ (EPDH), to identify ecosystem-based alternatives at four hierarchical design levels: 1) alternatives to port developments, 2) port site selection, 3) port layout design, and 4) design of structures and materials. In applying the EPDH framework retrospectively to a case study of port expansion in Tema, Ghana, we establish that ecosystem considerations played only a limited role in identifying and evaluating alternatives at all four design levels in the case study, with more eco-friendly alternatives in terms of port layouts, structures, and materials are identified using the EPDH framework. This reveals that opportunities for ecosystem-friendly port designs may have been missed and demonstrates the need for and the potential added value of our framework. The framework can assist practitioners in earlier and wider identification of ecosystem-based alternatives for a port’s marine infrastructure in future seaport developments and, hence, represents an important step towards more sustainable port designs.Item An Absorptive Capacity Perspective of Organizational Learning Through Social Media: Evidence From the Ghanaian Fashion Industry(IGI Global, 2018) Boateng, R.; Owusu-Bempah, E.; Ansong, E.The Absorptive Capacity Theory was used as the theoretical lens for this study to help analyze how organizations absorb new knowledge using social media tools and applications. A survey of fashion designers and employees numbering 196 was carried out in 55 fashion firms whereas two fashion firms were used in a case study. Data analysis was performed using Structural Equation Modelling. The findings from the study suggest that Ghanaian fashion designers do not intensively use social media to assimilate knowledge but rather to acquire, transform, and exploit knowledge. The popular social media applications include; Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Facebook, for instance, is used daily by most Ghanaians.