The effects of urbanization, ICT, fertilizer usage, and foreign direct investment on carbon dioxide emissions in Ghana.

Rising levels of carbon dioxide emissions in emerging countries has become a concern to all and there are calls for urgent action to curtail this. Ghana's government has in recent times sought to achieve higher economic growth at a lower carbon emission rate. With the current development of the country, this study analyzed the effect of urbanization, fertilizer usage, foreign direct investment (FDI), and ICT development on carbon dioxide emissions in Ghana. Time series data for 1971-2018 period was analyzed using autoregressive distributed lag regression approach within the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) framework. From regression analysis, while the EKC hypothesis was not validated for aggregate carbon emissions, it was found that urbanization has a negative and significant impact on aggregate carbon emissions, whereas FDI and ICT infrastructure have positive impacts on the same in the both long run and short run. Fertilizer usage is seen to interact with urbanization to reduce carbon emissions at the aggregate and sectoral levels. It was found that although ICT helps reduce emissions at some sectoral levels, it was not enough to lower emissions at the aggregate level. Among other things, it is important for Ghana to take a critical assessment of its FDI sources and engagements to ensure that it does not become a sink for high toxic-emitting industries. Intensive education on efficient usage of fertilizer is also needed. It is important for policymakers to critically assess ways and means by which ICT development can be deployed to reduce overall carbon dioxide emissions in the country.

Perceptions of COVID-19 shocks and adoption of sustainable agricultural practices in Ghana.

Most studies on the novel COVID-19 pandemic have focused mainly on human health, food systems, and employment with limited studies on how farmers implement sustainable agricultural practices (SAPs) in response to the pandemic. This study examines how perceptions of COVID-19 shocks influence the adoption of SAPs among smallholder farmers in Ghana. We find that perceptions of COVID-19 shocks influence the probability and intensity of SAPs adoption. Secondly, households who anticipated COVID-19 shocks recorded heterogeneity effects in the combinations (complementarity and substitutability) of SAPs. Farmers who anticipated an increase in input prices and loss of income due to COVID-19 recorded the highest complementarity association between pesticide and zero tillage while farmers who expected limited market access reported the highest complementarity between mixed cropping and mulching. Farmers who projected a decrease in output prices complements pesticides with mixed cropping. The findings suggest that understanding the heterogeneity effects in the combinations of SAPs due to COVID-19 shocks is critical to effectively design, target and disseminate sustainable intensification programs in a post-pandemic period.

Explaining the Effects of Socioeconomic and Housing Characteristics on the Choice of Toilet Facilities among Ghanaian Households.

Open defecation remains a major environmental sanitation challenge facing all areas of Ghana. This notwithstanding, the socioeconomic drivers of this phenomenon are overlooked. This study, therefore, analysed the factors that influence the choice of toilet facilities over the practice of open defecation in the country. Ghana Living Standard Survey round 7 (GLSS7) data were analysed using multinomial logit regression. From the data, a majority of households used improved toilet facilities (WC, KVIP, and pit latrines with slab) in Ghana and over one-fourth of households engaged in open defecation. The regression result revealed that the choice of toilet facilities over the practice of open defecation was significantly influenced by the sex of the household head, age, household size, education, marital status, locating in urban areas, regional locations, ownership of dwelling, type of dwelling, expenditure on rent, expenditure quintile, and per capita consumption expenditure of the household. Specifically, male, younger, less educated, and first income-quintile household heads have higher probability of practicing open defecation in Ghana. These variables point to specific policy directions that should be corrected or targeted to minimize, if not eliminate, the practice of open defecation in the country. The Media Coalition Campaign against Open Defecation should be intensified and directed towards the males, youths, and the less educated populace. This study also justified that calls for Ghanaians to change their attitudes or behavior towards open defecation are mere rhetoric if such calls are not defined within the socioeconomic conditions of the people of the area.

Gender perspectives of climate change adaptation in two selected districts of Ghana.

This study analyzed gender differences in climate adaptation by farming households in Ghana. This involved 300 farmers from two districts of Ghana and the data analyzed using descriptive statistics. The results showed severer climate impacts on the livelihoods of females than males in Ghana. On the contrary, the adaptive capacity of males was found to be higher than that of females. This was supported by the observed differences in gender climate adaptation where both male heads and male household members had higher mean climate adaptations than both female heads and female household members. Overall, the climate adaptation strategies mostly adopted by both males and females include changing planting dates, row planting, planting early maturing and drought tolerant seed varieties, mixed farming, intercropping and refiling of farm plots. Except for zero tillage and intercropping, male farmers had high adoption levels than female farmers. It is concluded that the observed gender adaptation differences were due to the levels and intensity of adoption other than differences in the type of strategies adopted by the different gender groups. The Ministry of Food and Agriculture should consider integrating climate adaptation policies into current agricultural policies such as "planting for food and jobs" policy.

Do socioeconomic factors influence households' solid waste disposal systems? Evidence from Ghana.

Solid waste management remains a major challenge in Ghana, especially in the peri-urban and urban areas. The implications from this bottleneck are widely acknowledged. Nonetheless, fundamental issues such as the factors that drive households into the adoption of a particular solid waste disposal system have not been explored. This study applied a multinomial logit approach using 16,767 households in the Ghana Living Standard Survey round six data to examine whether or not socioeconomic factors influence households' decision to adopt a particular solid waste disposal system. The results established that a number of the hypothesised socioeconomic factors drive households into the use of a particular solid waste disposal system. For instance, education of households on solid waste management is important to increase households' decision into collecting wastes other than open dumping or burning. The characteristics of houses and the location of households also influence waste disposal systems in Ghana. We conclude that solid waste disposal at unapproved places was largely influenced by socioeconomic characteristics other than income or welfare of households. We recommend continuous advocacy programmes on improved solid waste management systems, led by the various decentralised governance structures such as the District Assemblies, to curb the menace.