Determinants of food availability and access in Ghana: what can we learn beyond the regression results?

The study analyses the determinants of food availability and access, and the causes of unsustainable food access in Ghana using three models. Regression results show that the effects of energy price, domestic and foreign interest rates, domestic prices and exchange rate on food availability are negative, while the effects of crop yield, arable land, liberalisation of agricultural trade and real income are positive. The analysis further shows the unique effects of energy price and human capital exceed their common effects. However, the common effects of domestic and foreign interest rates, inflation, crop yield, arable land, exchange rate, liberalisation of agricultural trade and income exceed their unique effects. The access model shows that the effects of domestic interest rate, exchange rate and oil price are negative. The unique effect of oil price exceeds the variable’s common effect. However, the common effects of exchange rate, interest rate and income exceed their unique effects. The stability model shows that good news and higher incomes enhance sustainable food access. However, higher oil price and depreciation of the local currency distort sustainable food access. The policy implication is that government should jointly target variables with higher common effects when addressing food access and availability. Withdrawal of government fuel subsidy will increase consumers’ risk of accessing food and hence threaten the sustainability of food access

The DDT Effect: The case of Economic Growth, Public Debt and Democracy Relationship

This study contributes to the research on the economic growth, public debt and democracy relationship using the case of Ghana. We posit that, (1) the capacity of a country to tolerate higher debt is dependent on the quality of institutions, and (2) the growth enhancing effect of democracy depends on the initial debt levels. The results point to an inverse relationship between the quality of institution and the capacity of the country to tolerate higher debt. Further, the growth enhancing effect of democracy is crucially dependent on the initial debt-to-GDP ratio. Several robustness checks conducted confirmed these results

Electricity Supply and System losses in Ghana. What is the red line? Have we crossed over?

Electricity supply and sustainable economic development are two complementary forces. However, in Ghana, the capacity limitations in the electricity sector has restraint production levels threatening the sustainable development of the country. The aim of this study is to investigate the key drivers of electricity supply in Ghana. Specifically, we determine the red line in system losses and whether we have crossed over the red line. Further, the effects of pricing, climate change, investment, and economic growth are examined. We identified the major constraints to electricity supply as inefficient pricing, rising fuel cost, higher system losses, and climate change. Adopting the marginal cost pricing rule and reducing distribution losses below 5% will help improve electricity supply security significantly in the country. Further, achieving a sustained economic growth will help boost supply security as well as investing in renewable energies

Energy demand management in selected African countries

This thesis contains five empirical papers that contribute to the energy demand management literature on Africa. It investigates the following policy issues – business cycle and energy conservation, government fuel subsidies and energy efficiency, economic growth and environmental quality, structural effects in parameters, the transition between energy efficiency and energy inefficiency, forecast of energy demand, shifts in demand behaviour, and the persistence profile of energy demand to shocks – using data from five countries: Algeria, Nigeria, South Africa, Cameroon and Ghana. In terms of contribution, this thesis provides the first empirical attempt to investigate the transition between energy efficiency and energy inefficiency; provides a comprehensive analysis of road transport energy demand and the implications of structural breaks for model parameters; provides evidence to support the fact that economic growth and environmental quality are jointly achievable, and argues that there is an income state that drives investment in energy efficiency. The main results of the thesis are as follows. First, low income state does not promote investment in energy efficiency. Second, reducing or withdrawing government fuel subsidies will enhance energy efficiency. Third, investment in technology in the industrial sector is a likely panacea to integrate the goals of economic growth and environmental quality. Fourth, the existence of structural breaks in the data significantly changes how price of crude oil, FDI, economic structure and trade openness promote energy efficiency. Fifth, the characteristics of industries and technology absorptive capacity of countries significantly facilitate energy savings in FDI. Sixth, the duration of an energy inefficient state is about twice as long as an energy efficient state, mainly due to fuel subsidies, low income, high corruption, regulatory inefficiencies, poorly developed infrastructure and undeveloped markets. Finally, diesel and gasoline fuels differ in many respects which suggest that a discriminatory tax policy would be an appropriate tax policy than a uniform tax policy

Electricity Consumption-Economic Growth Nexus: The Ghanaian Case

Research into the electricity-economic growth nexus has important implications for energy conservation measures and environmental policy. However, results from the energy-economic growth nexus have been mixed in the literature on Ghana. This posses serious problems for the country’s energy policy. Much research is thus, required to establish the direction of causality between energy and economic growth. Nonetheless, less evidence is available for Ghana. It is against this background that this study seeks to investigate the direction of causality between a type of energy, electricity, and economic growth to add to the existing argument in the literature. The Toda and Yomamoto Granger Causality Test was used to carry out the test of causality between electricity consumption and economic growth from 1971 to 2008. The results obtained herein revealed that there exists a unidirectional causality running from economic growth to electricity consumption. Thus, data on Ghana supports the Growth-led-Energy Hypothesis. The results imply that electricity conservation measures are a viable option for Ghana. Keywords: Ghana; Real GDP per capita; Electricity consumption; Toda and Yomamoto; Granger Causality Test; Bounds cointegration JEL Classifications: Q400; Q43

Electricity Supply and System losses in Ghana. What is the red line? Have we crossed over?

Electricity supply and sustainable economic development are two complementary forces. However, in Ghana, the capacity limitations in the electricity sector has restraint production levels threatening the sustainable development of the country. The aim of this study is to investigate the key drivers of electricity supply in Ghana. Specifically, we determine the red line in system losses and whether we have crossed over the red line. Further, the effects of pricing, climate change, investment, and economic growth are examined. We identified the major constraints to electricity supply as inefficient pricing, rising fuel cost, higher system losses, and climate change. Adopting the marginal cost pricing rule and reducing distribution losses below 5% will help improve electricity supply security significantly in the country. Further, achieving a sustained economic growth will help boost supply security as well as investing in renewable energies

The DDT Effect: The case of Economic Growth, Public Debt and Democracy Relationship

This study contributes to the research on the economic growth, public debt and democracy relationship using the case of Ghana. We posit that, (1) the capacity of a country to tolerate higher debt is dependent on the quality of institutions, and (2) the growth enhancing effect of democracy depends on the initial debt levels. The results point to an inverse relationship between the quality of institution and the capacity of the country to tolerate higher debt. Further, the growth enhancing effect of democracy is crucially dependent on the initial debt-to-GDP ratio. Several robustness checks conducted confirmed these results

Energy Efficiency Transitions in China: How persistent are the movements to/from the frontier?

This study examines the energy efficiency transitions in China using provincial data covering the period 2003–2015. Sustainable progress in energy efficiency achievements is beneficial to energy insecurity and the achievement of the Paris Agreement. This article combines the stochastic frontier method with the panel Markov-switching regression to model energy efficiency transitions. Estimated energy efficiency scores showed significant regional and provincial heterogeneity. Also, while human capital development, urbanization, and foreign direct investment promote energy efficiency, price and income per capita reduce it. The transition probabilities indicate that the high energy-efficient state is less sustainable, and the movement towards the frontier seems less persistent than movement from the frontier. Thus, it appears that China is not making sustainable progress in energy efficiency. The unsustainable nature of the high energy-efficient state suggests that in China, there are weak energy efficiency efforts and energy efficiency policies lack robustness

Quality of institution and the FEG (forest, energy intensity, and globalization) -environment relationships in sub-Saharan Africa

The current share of sub-Saharan Africa in global carbon dioxide emissions is negligible compared to major contributors like Asia, Americas, and Europe. This trend is, however, likely to change given that both economic growth and rate of urbanization in the region are projected to be robust in the future. The current study contributes to the literature by examining both the direct and the indirect impacts of quality of institution on the environment. Specifically, we investigate whether the institutional setting in the region provides some sort of a complementary role in the environment-FEG relationships. We use the panel two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM) technique to deal with the simultaneity problem. Data consists of 43 sub-Saharan African countries. The result shows that energy inefficiency compromises environmental standards. However, the quality of the institutional setting helps moderate this negative consequences; countries with good institutions show greater prospects than countries with poor institutions. On the other hand, globalization of the region and increased forest size generate positive environmental outcomes in the region. Their impacts are, however, independent of the quality of institution. Afforestation programs, promotion of other clean energy types, and investment in energy efficiency, basic city infrastructure, and regulatory and institutional structures, are desirable policies to pursue to safeguard the environment

The Technical Decomposition of Carbon Emissions and the Concerns about FDI and Trade Openness Effects in the United States

This paper decomposes the environmental Kuznets curve into the scale, technique and composition effects while incorporating the roles of energy consumption, trade openness and foreign direct investments (FDI) effects in a carbon emissions function for the United States (U.S.). We have incorporated information about unknown structural breaks into this function while investigating the cointegration between the related variables. The empirical results confirm the existence of cointegration between the variables in the presence of structural breaks. Moreover, the scale effect increases carbon dioxide emissions, but the technique effect reduces it as expected. Energy consumption also adds to carbon emissions, while the composition effect improves environmental quality by lowering carbon dioxide emissions. Further, trade openness decreases carbon dioxide emissions. However, increases in FDI hamper environmental quality by increasing carbon emissions. To reduce the level of carbon emissions, the technical processes of production should be improved by investing in technological innovations and capital stock and upgrading environmental regulations to channel in environment-friendly FDIs. There should also be a transformation of the energy consumption structure towards cleaner energy sources