Assessing the Role of Non-Governmental Organizations in Ghana’s Development The Case of the World Vision International in the Jirapa District of The Upper West Region

Abstract

World Vision International as one of the major NGOs in Ghana is playing a dominant role in the development of people in Ghana especially in the rural areas due to the failure of the state to meet the basic needs of its citizens. WVI is contributing not in any small way to the development of both economic and social conditions of people in the Jirapa district in particular and also in the country at large. The study identified some of the programmes and activities of WVI in providing the basic needs of people in the Jirapa district to include economic empowerment through loans, supporting education, assisting farmers and women, providing employment opportunities, protection of people rights, undertaking food security strategies, improving health care delivery and providing potable water. The mixed method of qualitative and quantitative was used. The primary and secondary data were collected using questionnaires and interview guides. Simple random sampling was used to select the respondents and purposive sampling was used to identify 80 households for the study. The study also revealed what the community members expected from WVI as an NGO and this included the need to provide educational facilities, improved health care delivery, potable water, social justice, food security and loans; some of which are already being met by WVI. Programme sustainability responsibilities of the activities of WVI have also been digested. This entails reducing unemployment, inequality and poverty in Ghanaian communities. Some challenges in the area of the study are difficulty in the mobilization of the communities‘ members for WVI programmes, bureaucratic procedures in getting assistance from WVI, unwillingness of the local people to change their outmoded cultural practices and refusal to pay loans on the part of those who have benefited from the credit schemes were identified as threats to the Vision Fund. Suggestions to problems here include the need for WVI to take legal measures to retrieve loans given out to beneficiaries who default. The involvement of local people by NGOs in problems identification, projects planning and implementation and monitoring would lead to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). At the end of the study it came to light that NGOs are indeed playing complementary roles in providing the basic needs of people in Ghana especially in the rural areas to improve development.