Analysis of the relationship between quality and price of yam in Ghana - second round (NRI report no. 2428)

In 1997, NRI staff and officers from the Ghanaian Ministry of Food and Agriculture conducted two quantitative surveys of yam trading in Techiman market. The aim was to establish the importance of financial losses caused by poor yam quality and to measure the relationships between price and a series of quality defect variables. This report summarises the analysis of data gathered during the second survey. Data was analysed using multiple regression. Of the nine quality variables measured in the market, only "rotting" could be proved to have a significant influence on price. This result should not be interpreted to mean that other quality variables do not have an impact on price, merely that there was insufficient variation in quality for the statistical techniques to prove the existence of other price quality relationships. Moreover, at the time of the survey, these findings suggest that the financial losses caused by quality defects were slight. The report concludes with suggestions for improving the data gathering methodology for future surveys. In particular, it recommends extensive qualitative surveys to establish the incidence of quality defect related financial losses throughout the year. If these surveys indicate high financial losses, the research should attempt to establish the quantitative nature of price quality relationships using biased sampling techniques

Investigating the Implications of Code-Switching and Assimilating at Work for African American Professionals

The purpose of this study is to understand the experiences Black Professionals face assimilating to majority cultural norms. Through analysis of qualitative data of 14 one-hour interviews of Black People employed at the director+ level, this study examined the experiences of assimilating and the impact on overall wellbeing of Black People in the American Workplace. The results indicated the workplace does not encourage Black People to truly bring their full selves to work. Implications for practice include considering cultural and lifestyle norms of minorities in the workplace as organizations continue their efforts to encourage their employees to bring their full selves to work. Limitations, practical applications, and future research areas are also discussed

Essays On The Effects of Risk and Ambiguity Attitudes On Production Choices Of Smallholder Fish Farmers In Southern Ghana

This thesis contains four empirical chapters which together contribute to behavioural economics in the area of fish production in a developing country context. The key thread connecting all the empirical studies is the behavioural characteristic of farmers (risk and ambiguity attitudes) elicited through incentivised field experiments and general survey questions. The first empirical chapter seeks to answer the questions: What is the risk attitude of a typical smallholder fish farmer in a developing country? Do risk attitudes of fish farmers remain stable across different elicitation methods and contexts of validation? Risk attitude measures are known to be sensitive to the method of elicitation and context (Bauermeister and Mushoff, 2016). The purpose of this chapter is three-fold. 1. It elicits and compares the risk attitudes of within-subject sample of smallholder fish farmers in southern Ghana using three of the frontier methods used to elicit risk attitudes in the literature. The risk attitudes elicited from these methods are employed in the subsequent chapters of this thesis to investigate how risk preferences affect production efficiency and technology adoption. 2. It investigates how the risk attitude measures correlate with each other, and how they vary with farmer characteristics. 3. It assesses whether the risk attitude measures can predict farmer responses to questions on hypothetical economic choices. The results show that a typical smallholder fish farmer is risk preferring in the gains-only lottery experiment, risk averse in the gains-and-losses lottery experiment but is risk neutral from the self-reported risk attitude scale. However, the risk attitude measures from the two lottery experiments are positively correlated, consistent with the assumption that the two experiments capture similar traits of the same farmer. This confirms that risk attitude measures are influenced by the method of elicitation and the context being examined. Some personal characteristics of the farmers influence their risk attitudes. Finally, while risk preferences from the lottery experiments failed to explain hypothetical economic choices, the stated risk preferences were significantly correlated with some hypothetical economic choices, perhaps due to hypothetical bias. These results indicate that care should be taken to tailor the elicitation of risk attitudes to contexts and domains farmers are familiar with. The second empirical analysis attempts to answer the question: to what extent does a fish farmer's risk attitude affect his/her level of economic efficiency? This is predicated on the assumption that the types, levels and frequency of application of inputs could be influenced by the risk attitudes of farmers. Data on the units of inputs, outputs and prices are collated from the farmers in an earlier survey, and their risk attitudes obtained from the previous chapter are then juxtaposed on their production data. The economic efficiency of the farmers is assessed with both the Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) and the Corrected Ordinary Least Squares (COLS) techniques. While the former assumes that all deviations from the cost frontier are due to farmer-specific factors (including risk attitudes) and stochastic factors, the latter, a deterministic procedure, attributes all deviations from the frontier to farmer-specific factors. The evidence from this chapter suggests that over 80% of the total deviation from the cost frontier results from stochastic factors beyond the control of the farmers. It is also found that risk attitudes play no significant role in the economic efficiency of fish production in the study area. Based on the findings, it is concluded that stochastic factors, such as government policies, may have a greater impact on economic efficiency rather than risk attitudes of farmers. The third empirical study assesses how risk attitudes of fish farmers affect the speed of technology adoption; adoption decisions are modelled with duration models. This study focuses on the adoption of Floating Cages, Extruded Feed and Akosombo Strain of Tilapia (AST) technologies in the fish farming sector in southern Ghana. Contrary to most existing literature on speed of adoption of technologies (e.g. Liu, 2013), the results from this chapter show that risk averse farmers have a higher proclivity to adopt the AST, Extruded Feed and Floating Cage technologies at a point in time. This novel outcome is due to the nature of the technologies in question, as perceived by the farmers. Liu's (2013) study, for instance, focuses on the adoption of cotton seeds modified genetically with Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) bacteria, which enables cotton plants to produce phytotoxins to kill pests. The subjective risks posed by these phytotoxins to the farmers themselves may be an additional source of uncertainty and a likely reason for the delayed adoption by risk averse farmers. However, in this chapter, even though the AST is also genetically modified, it produces no toxins and yet it is more disease-resistant than the local breeds, therefore it may be perceived by the farmers as risk-reducing and hence it may not be surprising that risk averse farmers adopt this technology earlier. In the final empirical study, attention is on how ambiguity attitudes affect the farming decisions of smallholder fish farmers, using the speed of adopting the AST technology as an example of such decisions. The speed of technology adoption is analysed with the hazard/survival model. Additionally, this chapter introduces and interacts the number of previous adopters in the same village with ambiguity attitude as a better test of the effect of ambiguity aversion on farmers' decisions. Where a farmer cannot predict with certainty the yield to be obtained from the new technology, an ambiguity averse farmer is expected to adopt the technology late. Ambiguity attitudes are elicited with Ellsberg's (1961) two-colour urn experiment. The results from this chapter show that the average fish farmer is ambiguity averse. However, risk aversion, but not ambiguity aversion, has a significant effect on the speed of adopting the AST technology in the study area, confirming the robustness of the finding in the previous chapter. I also find that the speed of adopting this technology increases with the number of prior adopters in the same village. The lack of any significant impact of ambiguity attitudes in determining the speed of adopting this technology suggests that there are other important determinants of adopting this technology, rather than lack of information about it, that affect other technology adoption decisions. Overall, this thesis demonstrates and presents the elicitation of risk and ambiguity preferences outside the usual laboratory setting by engaging fish farmers in a field experiment involving real cash incentives, as well as field surveys. The experiments and methods employed are at the frontier of research in the field of development economics. The results of the analysis presented in this thesis indicate that that risk preferences are sensitive to the method of elicitation, as well as the context or domain in which it is elicited. While contrary to findings from other studies, risk averse farmers are more prone to adopt improved fish farming technologies earlier than farmers who are not risk averse. This conclusion is plausible because the technologies may be perceived as risk-reducing by the farmers. This outcome remains robust when ambiguity aversion is introduced into the analysis of the technology adoption decision. Therefore, research on farmer production choices should take their risk attitudes into account, and such risk attitude measures should be elicited in a manner that is compatible with the context of operation of the farmers

Survey of yam trading practices and loss assessment in Techiman Market (NRI report no. R6505)

The aim of this report is to gain an understanding of the structure of yams marketing in and around Techiman Market in Ghana, and to understand the extent and impact of quality deterioration (called 'physical losses' in this report) on the farmers' and traders' revenues. It should be noted that the data collected on marketing margins and losses was collected using informal techniques which provide indicative results

Educational Program for Decreasing Catheter-Associated Urinary Tract Infections

Catheter-associated urinary tract infection (CAUTI) is the most common hospital-acquired illness. Insertion and maintenance of urinary catheters are critical factors that predispose patients to CAUTI. Studies have shown that many nurses have a knowledge deficit regarding evidence-based practices in the insertion and management of urinary catheters, which can help prevent CAUTI. This is a concern because nurses are typically the first point of contact with patients and are responsible for the promotion of evidence-based practice and preventative measures. Therefore, this project aimed to develop an educational intervention for nurses with a focus on proper insertion and maintenance of indwelling urinary catheters. Lewin’s theory of planned change was used to provide the theoretical framework. The education program was developed based on recommended practices for CAUTI prevention and management. A paired t-test was used to analyze the differences in the knowledge scores of the nurses before and after the intervention (n=62). The average knowledge score of the participants improved significantly following the provision of the intervention by 11.4% (95% CI: 9.7, 13.0; p \u3c 0.001) while CAUTI rates decreased by 55%. The findings show that educating nurses on evidence-based practices on catheter insertion, maintenance, and timely removal is an effective approach to decreasing CAUTI rates. The reduction in CAUTI rates can promote social change by decreasing healthcare costs and length of hospital stay

Informal Communication and Health-seeking Behaviours in Ghana

Only abstract. Paper copies of master’s theses are listed in the Helka database (http://www.helsinki.fi/helka). Electronic copies of master’s theses are either available as open access or only on thesis terminals in the Helsinki University Library.Vain tiivistelmä. Sidottujen gradujen saatavuuden voit tarkistaa Helka-tietokannasta (http://www.helsinki.fi/helka). Digitaaliset gradut voivat olla luettavissa avoimesti verkossa tai rajoitetusti kirjaston opinnäytekioskeilla.Endast sammandrag. Inbundna avhandlingar kan sökas i Helka-databasen (http://www.helsinki.fi/helka). Elektroniska kopior av avhandlingar finns antingen öppet på nätet eller endast tillgängliga i bibliotekets avhandlingsterminaler.This thesis studies medical beliefs and practices in Ghana. Its aim is to analyse the kind of social interaction/social relations inherent in informal communication in health-seeking behaviours. The primary aim, however, is to look for people's social meaning of illness-- what sense they make of illness-- in the interplay between informal communication and health-seeking activities. The study is based in Twuim, a rural fishing village in Ghana. It is descriptive, exploratory, and largely ethnographic in approach. The ethnographic data is based on more than five months of participant observation fieldwork and unstructured ethnographic interviews with 33 respondents. Social relations and interaction are important in informal communication in the quest for therapy. The family emerges as the unit for therapy communication and social relations. Thus, three case studies are presented as part of the analysis of the family and therapy discussions. This study shows that people make sense of illness through known relationships with people such as family members and care providers, and known cultural categories such as witchcraft/oracles and biomedical health care promotion. Through these mechanisms, the people derive their social meaning of illness largely from both natural and supernatural ideas about illness. The analytical focus follows Arthur Kleinman's model of sector analysis of medical systems, which uses the structuralist approach. The other framework is the analysis of discourse, following Michel Foucault. One of the main conclusions is a suggestion for the integration of biomedicine and traditional medicine in Ghana as a way to expand the country's health care resources.Tape include

The effect of academic textiles studies on the Ghana textile industry

Purpose: The study sought to examine the impact of institutional textiles research on the textile industry in Ghana to make feasible projections towards the effective implementation of research findings for the revitalization and sustainability of the Ghana textile industry. Design/Methodology/Approach: Adopting the quantitative evaluation research methods with questionnaires and interviews as the main instrumentation for data collection. Purposive sampling and stratified random sampling techniques were used to select 142 respondents. Though, only 54 respondents participated in the research.. The data was analysed descriptively using frequency. Findings: The study revealed that despite the upsurge of research works with concrete and feasible recommendations in curbing the challenges of the textile factories, the lack of industry/academia collaboration is what impedes the effective implementation of these research findings to address the issues. Research Limitation: The study focused on two major large-scale textile factories in Ghana; Tex Styles Ghana Limited (TGL) and Akosombo Textiles Limited (ATL) alongside research publications of Ghanaian institutions of high repute like KNUST, Takoradi Technical University, University of Education, University of Cape Coast and the University of Ghana were targeted for the study. Practical Implication: There should be a strong partnership between industry and academia through collaborative research, a policy on the implementation of research findings, allocation of funds for textile researchers and a monitoring system by the government to ensure full implementation of research findings. Social Implication: The study, therefore, calls on the government to monitor these policies to ensure that they are in full effective operation and implemented to the highest peak. Originality/ value: the findings of this study provide numerous recommendations by academic institutions of higher learning aimed at revamping the declining industry which when fully implemented will help boost the rise of the industries

MINING RELATED ARSENIC PROBLEMS IN GHANA

Ghana is Africa\u27s second-largest gold producing country after South Africa. Most mining areas particularly in Ashanti Region (Obuasi) and Western Region (Tarkwa), until the introduction of the bio-oxidation (BIOX) technology of extracting gold, the processing of the ore for gold involved the crushing and grinding of ore to fine powder followed by dissolution and precipitation of free gold. During the ore preparation by roasting, sulphur dioxide and As trioxide were released into terrestrial and atmospheric environments. As rich tailings heaped and kept in dams were left at the mercy of the rain with subsequent leaching into rivers, streams and aquifers. Other mine wastes as particulates were transported far and near through the air. There is also continuous wet and dry deposition of particles unto land, water and plants. Humans and animals are exposed to As through drinking, diet and inhalation

Competitiveness and determinants of coffee exports, producer price and production for Ethiopia

The objective of this study was to analyze the performance of Ethiopia in its exports of coffee and to estimate the magnitude and effects of key economic determinants of coffee exports, producer price and production. In analyzing the competitiveness of the country in its exports of coffee, three distinct periods were considered, namely, years under the imperial regime (1961-73), under the military rule (1974-1991) and under the reformist government (1992-2010). The Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) and Revealed Symmetric Comparative Advantage (RSCA) measures of competitiveness were used for the analysis. Even though the results show that Ethiopia has comparative advantage in export of coffee, the same cannot be said of its overall performance on the international market owing to factors such as challenges with management of price risk, high transaction cost resulting from the extensive nature of the supply chain and the numerous actors and processes therein, challenges with quality control, low productivity of growers’ fields, and incidence of smuggling. To improve upon its export performance and to ensure continuous growth in the major strongholds of the subsector (exports, prices and production), based upon estimates for the current study, we propose investment in yield-enhancing innovations, devising and implementation of measures to improve quality control in the supply chain, address issues with price risk, minimize incidence of smuggling and more importantly minimize transaction costs. In addition, measures should be put in place to increase and ensure continuous government support to the subsector, hold onto the current devaluation of the Ethiopian birr, ensure payment of fair prices to growers and appropriately transmit future increments, increase current area under cultivation to enhance efficient utilization of the abundant labour, and to attract more export-oriented foreign direct investments (as an opportunity for trade creation)

The Effects of Risk and Ambiguity Aversion on Technology Adoption: Evidence from Aquaculture in Ghana

We study how aversion to risk and ambiguity affects the adoption of new technologies by Ghanaian smallholder aquafarmers. We conduct a set of field experiments designed to elicit farmers’ risk and ambiguity preferences and combine it with surveybased information on their technology adoption decisions. We find that aquafarmers who are more risk-averse were quicker to adopt the new technologies: a fast-growing breed of tilapia fish, extruded feed and floating cages. By contrast, ambiguity aversion has no effect on the adoption of the new tilapia breed and extruded feed. Furthermore, it slows down the adoption of floating cages - a technology which entails higher fixed costs than the others - and the effect is diminishing in the number of other adopters in the village. We argue that these differential effects are due to the fact that the technologies are risk-reducing, with potential ambiguity about their payoff distributions at the early stages of adoption. The findings highlight the importance of distinguishing between risk and ambiguity in investigating technology adoption decisions of small-holder farmers in developing countrie