Millennium Development Goals in Ghana

GCAP concert; Ghana, September 2005 © Millennium Campaign

Ghana is often praised for one of the fastest rates of poverty reduction in Africa, the figures claiming a fall in poverty from 52% in 1991 to 28% in 2005, almost sufficient to achieve the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of halving poverty. The World Food Programme plans to exit Ghana in 2010, describing the country as one of few to have met the 1996 Food Summit commitment of halving its number of undernourished people. No fewer than 17 donor countries have scrambled to embrace a success story in Africa, signing up to a joint funding strategy. The normally reticent Millennium Challenge Corporation has lavished its largest grant on Ghana, $547 million over 5 years.

Closer analysis of the figures throws an element of doubt on these superlatives. The MDG Progress Report published in 2003 defines the poverty line as the "proportion below national basic needs" without further elaboration. The statistics themselves are drawn from a periodic census known as the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS), but it is difficult to ascertain the basis for threshold levels of income poverty or how they evolve. Even the 177-page Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy 2006-2009 (GPRS II) fails to provide an explanation of how poverty is calculated in Ghana. Most telling of all, the internationally recognised threshold for extreme poverty, $1 per day of purchasing power, is assessed by the 2007 UNDP Human Development Report to capture 44.8% of Ghana's population, effectively unchanged from the 45.5% recorded in the baseline year of 1990. And the proportion of underweight children has reduced only to 22% from the baseline 27.4%.

Rice farming in Ghana

It is possible that these inconsistencies are linked to regional inequality between the north and south of Ghana which is universally acknowledged to be considerable. Whilst many areas of the south enjoy two crops each year, the North, Upper East and Upper West provinces are mostly savannah where the dry season invariably brings food shortages. All human development indicators are very poor for these areas. For example, although primary education enrolment has edged above 90% overall, thanks to the scrapping of fees and provision of "capitation" grants to encourage schooling, in northern Ghana over 40% of girls remain out of school.

Health and HIV/AIDS in Ghana

A young girl in Patriensah, Ghana

Health indicators are less ambiguous and tend to support the more negative interpretation of progress in Ghana. Child and maternal mortality rates have not improved over recent years, with less than 50% of births attended by a qualified health worker. Malaria remains a leading cause of death, and is the largest reason for outpatient hospital visits. A major initiative will distribute over 2 million bednets to all children under the age of 2 years.

In 2004 the government tried to put the finances of health provision on to a sustainable footing by introducing the National Health Insurance Scheme in which all adults pay a modest monthly subscription in return for equal and universal access to health care. However the resulting services are uneven due to the lack of capacity and the uncertain position of the poorest who are supposed to be exempt from the fee. It is estimated that two thirds of the doctors and nurses trained in Ghana have left the country for better economic prospects overseas. Rural areas are particularly hard hit and many northern regions have no access to doctors at all.

The prevalence of HIV/AIDS has stabilised at 2.3%. The Ghana AIDS Commission has brought together high level government leadership in managing an extensive prevention program and a special World Bank loan which is used to fund grassroots AIDS NGOs. Nevertheless, access to essential anti-retrovirals remains poor with only 10,000 receiving treatment out of 63,000 who need it.
The Environment in Ghana

Ghana © Bernard Haven

Like most African countries Ghana will be extremely sensitive to the impact of climate change on its poor farmers. It has the additional serious vulnerability in the link between its primary energy supply and climate, most vividly illustrated in 2007. A long period of drought reduced the level of the Volta Lake below the point at which the hydro-electric turbine could function, effectively switching off 60% of Ghana's power supply with fundamental economic consequences. Then exceptional rainfall dramatically reversed the situation but caused catastrophic flooding in the northern region, affecting 400,000 people and creating serious short term food shortages. At the New York climate summit in September 2007, President Kufuor was able to reflect on the bitter experience of successive drought and flooding, stating that it was "obviously climate change related, if not wholly caused by it".

Water management problems extend also to the provision of safe water and sanitation. This is a particular problem for Ghana with MDG cost estimates of around $800m by 2015. The World Bank has provided a $100m loan to kickstart improvements, but its insistence on privatisation of government water operations as a condition of the loan has run into a barrage of criticism.
Politics in Ghana

Independence Arch, Accra © Bernard Haven

Following independence from British colonial rule in 1957 and an initial decade guided by Ghana's legendary first president, Kwame Nkrumah, the country suffered a period of instability with a series of governments falling to military uprisings. Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings, the engineer of two coups, established himself as president in 1981. Rawlings' commitment to free-market principles allowed him to leverage the resources of the international community, helping him stay in power longer than any other Ghanaian president. In 1992 he supported a new constitution allowing multiple political parties and duly won the presidential election held in that year and again in 1996. The new constitution barred him from running in 2000, when an opposition party, led by John Agyekum Kufuor, defeated Rawlings' hand-picked successor, marking Ghana's first democratic change of power.

John Kufuor, president of Ghana © United Nations' Integrated Regional Information Network

Democracy is thriving in Ghana. The government has refrained from interfering with media or opposition criticism and Ghanaians debate political issues amongst numerous political parties in a climate free of intimidation and coercion across the county. Academics at Ghana's universities publish on a range of topics and unions represent many of Ghana's workers. Civil society has also flourished. While NGOs are required to obtain government registration, the process is generally routine.

Over 80% of the electorate voted in the December 2004 presidential and parliamentary poll in which John Kufuor was elected for a second term. His party, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) also gained a majority of seats in parliament over its main opposition, the National Democratic Congress (NDC). The battle between the parties will resume in elections due in December 2008.

Whilst Ghana's ranking in the Corruption Perceptions Index published by Transparency International is more favourable than most African countries, low rates of pay in the police, health service and government departments do create problems in everyday transactions. However, Ghana is a member of the New International Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) where it has acceded to the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), the first country to undergo this comprehensive review of its system of governance.
Conflict in Ghana

Odwira, Ghana © Bernard Haven

There are over 70 ethnic groups in Ghana and intra-ethnic conflicts are particularly prone to occur in the Northern Region where rivalry between tribal chiefs was allowed to develop in the colonial period. An unresolved chieftaincy dispute in Dagbon dating from 2002 is being watched with particular concern.

The constitution strives to address the risks of ethnic division. Political parties cannot be overtly aligned to ethnic or religious identities and must demonstrate a "national character" to qualify for registration. Public appointments are expected to balance regional and ethnic interests; for example President Kufuor has appointed a northern Muslim as his Vice President. Any ethnic conflict is possibly more likely to originate in regional economic inequality than political allegiance.
Human Rights in Ghana

Human rights are well-respected in Ghana, including freedom of expression, association, and religion. Notably, a National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) was established to review alleged human rights abuses during the Rawlings era, although some have accused the government of using the Commission as a tool to tarnish the reputations of political opponents. The NRC report was published in 2005 and President Kufuor has accepted its radical recommendations to make public apologies and pay compensation to about 2,000 victims of the abuse of previous governments.

Although female genital mutilation is forbidden in Ghana, women are believed to suffer high levels of domestic violence; a parliamentary bill addressing the issue has not progresssed. Likewise there has been no progress to lift the ban on homosexuality which is described by the relevant minister as offensive to the culture of Ghana.
Information and Media in Ghana

Children at a Ghana school: Will ICT help?

Ghana has a wide range of newspapers and radio stations critical of government policies. Although the most widely circulated newspapers are government owned, including the popular Daily Graphic, a variety of independent radio stations broadcasting across the country regularly debate government policy without interference. Ghana was singled out for its improving record in the 2006 Press Freedom Index report and enjoys the creditably high position of 29 in the 2007 Index.

Although cost and training restraints have limited the spread of ICTs, internet access is widespread in urban areas, and is commonly used by students, larger businesses and NGOs. One of the first African countries to develop a National ICT Policy and with exceptional growth in household telephone lines, Ghana hosted the African region preparatory meeting for the World Summit on the Information Society in February 2005.
The Economy in Ghana

cocoa tree

Committed to market-based economic reforms since 1983, Ghana's economic progress will be carefully watched by both critics and proponents of IMF and World Bank development policies. Sound relations with these institutions and international donors have produced good results by the conventional benchmark of economic growth rates but do nothing to alter the structural injustice that undermines African economies. Ghana's dominant export product, cocoa, remains heavily dependent on commodity prices and currency fluctuations whilst unfair rules for trade with rich countries have hindered development, illustrated most painfully by the collapse of the previously thriving chicken industry.

However, twenty difficult years of structural reform did culminate in substantial debt cancellation awarded at the 2005 G8 summit, amounting to $4.2 billion out of the then total external debt of $6 billion. The country benefits from about $1 billion in aid each year whilst overseas remittances rocketed to $4 billion in 2006, about 25% of Ghana's GDP. Prospects for natural resources are more positive with the gold price rising sharply and the dramatic discovery during 2007 of extensive offshore oilfields which may generate up to $1 billion pa for the economy. Ghana is preparing carefully to ensure that the mixed blessings of a potentially oil-rich economy do not undermine its ambition to become a middle income country by 2015.



The OneWorld Ghana Guide was first published in this format in November 2004 with a text written by Volunteer Editor Bernard Haven

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