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Several studies have used various datasets and methodologies to analyze the relationship between bilateral trade and income convergence among trading partners. However, most studies have not paid attention to the effect that income levels and nature of bilateral trade have on the speed of income convergence. In this paper, we argue that the income levels of trading partners and the nature of bilateral trade play important role in the relationship between bilateral trade and international income convergence. To account for the effect of income levels of trading partners, this paper presents an approach that explicitly accounts for bilateral trade among high-income (OECD) countries, bilateral trade between high-income and low-income (SSA) countries, and bilateral trade among low-income (SSA) countries. We also used total trade data for 25 OECD countries and 30 Sub-Saharan African countries over the period 1980-2018 to avoid the potential bias for selecting certain countries based on arbitrary percentage of trade relationship. We used the 2SLS estimations technique to avoid endogeneity problems due to the nature of the dataset. The paper finds that the bilateral trade-income convergence relationship for OECD to SSA is the strongest. This result throws light on the claim that the nature of bilateral trade between high-income and low-income countries promotes one directional knowledge spillover from high-income to low-income countries which enables low-income countries to adopt new technologies and grow faster than their high-income counterparts. Also, bilateral trade among OECD countries, which mostly comprises of differentiated products, promotes descent income convergence among them. However, bilateral trade among SSA countries has the least effect on income convergence. Findings of the study have important implications for bilateral trade among low-income countries and between low income and high income countries. First, if SSA countries want to develop and catch up with their rich counterparts, they should continue to promote free trade with high income countries by dismantling remaining protection policies. Second, the African Continental Free Trade Area's (AfCFTA) efforts to boost the manufacturing sector through industrialization is in the right direction to promote the production of more differentiated products in Africa which will create growth in income for member countries as they trade more. Finally, there is the need for SSA countries to increase investment rates and improve human capital accumulation to enable them to accelerate the adoption of new technologies and grow faster than their high-income counterparts, while bridging the income gap between them through trade. JEL Classifications: F11; F14; O33; O47 Keywords: Economic Openness; Income Convergence; Bilateral Trade; Economic Growth; 2SLS Estimator, INTRODUCTION The implications of international trade on income differential among trading nations have been professionally researched since the works of neoclassical growth theorists (Solow, 1956; Swan 1956) which generated the [...]

Wastewater discharge into the environment in resource-poor countries poses a threat to public health. Studies in this area within these countries are limited, and the use of high-throughput whole-genome sequencing technologies is lacking. Therefore, understanding of environmental impacts is inadequate. The present study investigated the antibiotic resistance profiles and diversity of beta-lactamases in Escherichia coli strains isolated from environmental water sources in Accra, Ghana. Microbiological analyses were conducted on wastewater samples from three hospitals, a sewage and wastewater treatment plant, and water samples from two urban surface water bodies. Confirmed isolates (N = 57) were selected for phenotypic antibiotic resistance profiles. Multi-drug-resistant isolates (n = 25) were genome sequenced using Illumina MiSeq sequencing technology and screened for sequence types, antibiotic resistance, virulence and beta-lactamase genes, and mobile genetic elements. Isolates were frequently resistant to ampicillin (63%), meropenem (47%), azithromycin (46%), and sulfamethoxazole-trimethoprim (42%). Twenty different sequence types (STs) were identified, including clinically relevant ones such as ST167 and ST21. Five isolates were assigned to novel STs: ST14531 (n = 2), ST14536, ST14537, and ST14538. The isolates belonged to phylogroups A (52%), B1 (44%), and B2 (4%) and carried β-lactamase (TEM-1B, TEM-1C, CTX-M-15, and blaDHA-1) and carbapenemase (OXA-1, OXA-181) resistance genes. Dominant plasmid replicons included Col440I (10.2%) and IncFIB (AP001918) (6.8%). Polluted urban environments in Accra are reservoirs for antibiotic-resistant bacteria, posing a substantial public health risk. The findings underscore the need for targeted public health interventions to mitigate the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and protect public health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ODL (Open and Distance Learning) has come to stay. In recent years, there has been some extra-ordinary increasing international interest in it and Ghana is no exception. Currently, new ways of providing education are inevitable and ODL provides an effective alternate way. It represents approaches that focus on opening access to education and learning, freeing learners from the constraints of time and place and offering flexible learning opportunities to individuals/group. To the distant learner, ODL means increased access and flexibility and the combination of work and education. Many countries are trying to use ODL as a strategy for opening access to education. Inadequate infrastructure and professional competence in ODL serve as barriers. The study was designed to examine how learners can gain access to and success in learning. Again, it sought to ascertain some technologies which could be used to improve existing conditions at the IDL (Institute of Distance Learning), KNUST. The questionnaire was administered to 200 students and 20 facilitators. Stratified sampling was employed. The facilitators were interviewed. Lessons learnt include the fact that ODL will be an important element of future education and training. The emergent picture was that even though students use some computers, it could be extended to embrace other technologies, such as video conferencing, phone counseling and writing examinations on line so as to curtail any cultural and social barriers. It is worth noting that information could support the quality/variety of existing educational structures which enhance and consolidate capacity. Hopefully, usage of electronic information technologies in ODL would enhance retrieval/storage and distribution of information. It would also increase facilitation/communication among learners, facilitators and stakeholders in providing lifelong education. (Contains 2 tables.)

Consistent with Convention 87 of the International Labour Organization (ILO), Section 79 of the Labour Act, 2003 (Act 651) empowers every employee in an organization to either form or join a trade union of their choice for the promotion and protection of their economic and social interests. In spite of this legal provision, union coverage and density in Ghana have continually declined in recent years. The decline in union density and coverage is likely to decrease the collective bargaining strength of unions. It is against this background that our study seeks to examine the effect of unions' bargaining (proxied by union presence variable) on wages in Ghana. We employ the Heckman Selection Model and quantile regression technique to analyze data extracted from the sixth round of the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS 6) and 2015 Ghana Labour Force Survey (GLFS 2015) respectively. The findings indicate that unions' bargaining effect on wages is positive. Furthermore, the study finds that the union wage premium is highest at the lowest point of the wage distribution (25th quantile) but lowest at the highest point of the wage distribution (75th quantile). Whilst the study acknowledges the importance of education in earnings determination, we recommend that low-wage employees in a non-union establishment should join a trade union in order to earn a living/decent wage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The periods between post-discharge and full recovery can be challenging for most patients, since they have to be on self-care as they work their way back to full recovery. This study aimed to find out the experiences of discharged patients on self-care subsequent to major medical surgery at the Central Regional Teaching Hospital in Ghana. The study is informed by the qualitative research design. Experiences of twenty participants who had undergone surgery and were continuing with the recovery regimen at home were tapped into as the sample for the study. Purposive sampling technique was also adopted in selecting ten clinicians from the surgical ward to ascertain what went into preparing discharged patients to care for themselves at home after major medical surgery. Based on the findings of the study it was concluded that education, residential status, marital status, and availability and ability to convert social network into social capital constitute major social determinants of self-care. It was recommended among others that the social determinants of self-care identified above should inform plans aimed at preparing patients better to continue the recovery process on their own at home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of education on migration decisions focusing on rural and urban in-migrants by comparing the 2005/2006 and 2012/2013 rounds of the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS5 and GLSS6). After correcting for selectivity bias, the authors observed that anticipated welfare gain and socio-economic variables such as sector of employment, sex, experience, age, educational level and marital status significantly affect an individual’s migration decision. Design/methodology/approach – The authors made use of Sjaastad’s (1962) human capital framework as a basis for examining the impact of education on migration. The migration decision equation was based on the Heckman two stage procedure. Findings – While educational attainment is observed to have a positive effect on migration decision in the period 2005/2006, the authors find a negative effect of educational attainment on migration decision in the period 2012/2013. The effect of educational attainment on migration decision in 2005/2006 for urban in-migrant is higher than the effect for rural in-migrant, with its significance varying for the different stages of educational attainment. In absolute terms, whereas the effect of secondary educational attainment on migration decisions for urban in-migrant is higher than that of rural in-migrant, the reverse holds for higher educational attainment during the period 2012/2013. Social implications – Based on the mixed effect of education on migration decision as evident from the study, policies to enhance the educational system in Ghana should be complemented with job creations in the entire country. Moreover, special attention should be given to the rural sector in such a way that the jobs to be created in the sector do not require skilled workers. With quality education and job creation, the welfare of individuals living in urban and rural areas will be enhanced. Originality/value – In spite of the importance of education in migration decisions, there is scanty literature on the rural-urban dimension. To the best of the author’s knowledge there is no literature in the Ghanaian context which examines the rural and urban perspective of the impact of education on migration with a much recent data. Further, the author consider how the determinants of migration decision have changed over time focusing on rural and urban perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the causes of unemployment in Ghana from both labour demand and supply perspectives based on most recent cross sectional data set from one nationally representative household survey and a baseline survey for Millennium Development Support. Design/methodology/approach – A logit regression estimation technique is applied to two different household survey data sets of 2008 and 2013 to capture the effect of labour demand and supply on unemployment. Findings – Using education and age as capability variables to represent supply factors, unemployment is found to increase with education, and declines with age, confirming higher unemployment rate among the youth, than the old. The paper also observes strong influence of demand factors on unemployment based on relatively higher incidence of unemployment fulltime jobseekers relative to part-time jobseekers and seekers of formal or wage-employment and self-employment or SMEs compared with those seeking any job. Other factors such as the individual’s reservation wage, marital status, sex and poverty status as well as their rural-urban location are also found to cause unemployment in Ghana. Practical implications – Unemployment as a result of the inability of individuals to obtain a job of their choice in the midst of strong economic growth in Ghana suggests weak employment content of growth. In contrast, an increasing phenomenon of unemployment with education also reflects a problem of skill mismatch between skills churn out by education and training institutions and skills requirement by firms in the labour market. Originality/value – The originality of the paper and its contribution to existing literature largely emanate from the inclusion of demand factors in a cross sectional analysis of causes of unemployment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the role of search effort in the transition from unemployment to employment is not contentious, there is paucity of empirical evidence on the nexus between search effort and the duration of unemployment, especially in developing countries. Hence, this paper focuses on the time period in which the individual exits unemployment, using search intensity as a key explanatory variable. Data for the study is sourced from a survey of 404 formal sector workers in Accra who secured their first employment from 2005 and 2012. We disaggregated the transition period into three intervals namely; less than 1 month, between 1 and 12 months and more than 12 months, in order to achieve this objective. Using the multinomial logistic regression, we found that the use of multiple methods (search intensity) in the search process has a highly significant (p<0.001) effect on the probability of entering employment. In particular, using two additional methods decrease the probability of finding employment in less than 1 month by 11.4 percentage points but raises the prospect of entering into employment in the 1-12 months period by 9.8 percentage points. Other variables that significantly explain the duration of unemployment include age, years of schooling, sector of employment (private sector), family support and the year of employment. The paper concludes with a recommendation to realign the Labor Market Information System to the dynamics of the labor market [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unemployment is often cited as a measure of the low employment content of Ghana's strong growth performance over the past three decades. The paper presents evidence to suggest that employment growth in Ghana continues to trail economic growth due to high growth of low employment generating sectors against sluggish growth of high labour absorption sectors. A cross-sectional estimation of a probit regression model also indicates a strong effect of demand factors on unemployment, indicating a weak employment generating impact of economic growth. Empirical analysis also confirms higher vulnerability of youth and urban dwellers to unemployment with education and gender explaining unemployment in some instances. Reservation wage is also observed to have an increasing effect of unemployment. The paper recommends policies that promote investment in agriculture and manufacturing which is associated with higher employment elasticity of output. High incidence of unemployment among the youth and secondary school leavers in the most recent period requires targeted intervention including support for entrepreneurial training and start-up capital to attract young school leavers to become 'creators' rather than 'seekers' of jobs. A downward review of expectations on the part of jobseekers in terms of their reservation wage could help reduce unemployment in Ghana. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The desire of workers to engage in moonlighting, a phenomenon of multiple job-holding is a reflection of some of the changing labour market outcomes. Public sector workers who suffered loss of jobs through public sector retrenchment and privatisation as part of Ghana's economic reform resorted to holding more than one job to earn enough to avert any substantial drop in their living conditions. Despite the seemingly conspicuous existence of multiple job-holding in Ghana, much remains to be learnt about its determinants and characteristics of the phenomenon. This article employs the probit regression estimation technique based on the two most recent nationwide household surveys conducted in 1998/99 and 2005/06 to investigate the main determinants of moonlighting in Ghana. It provides empirical evidence to suggest that personal and household characteristics as well as location and labour market characteristics such as individual earnings and hours spent in the main job significantly influence an individual's desire to engage in more than one job. The study concludes that apart from the financial motive that drives an individual's decision to moonlight, the engagement of moonlighting on account of lower working hours in the individual's main job could be a symptom of visible or time-related underemployment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study re-examines the McKinnon-Shaw financial liberalization hypothesis, which posits simply that high real deposit interest rates increase financial savings, which in turn lead to increase in the quantity and quality of domestic investment. More specifically, the study investigates the impact of interest rate deregulation on investment in Ghana and the transmission mechanism through which this could happen. Utilizing cointegration and error correction model techniques with data for the period 1970-2005, the study's findings are as follows. While the study finds a statistically significant and positive relationship between real deposit interest rate and financial savings as well as between bank credit and financial savings, the net effect of a real deposit rate on investment is found to be negative. In other words, holding all other variables constant, a higher real deposit rate which leads to a higher increase in financial savings and then bank credit, is offset by a higher cost of lending, thus making the net effect on investment negative. In this regard, the findings do not seem to provide support for the McKinnon-Shaw financial liberalization hypothesis. Other variables found to be important in explaining investment in Ghana are the financial deepening, macroeconomic volatility that is proxied by inflation differential and the lagged change in GDP, affirming the accelerator model principle. The findings therefore have important policy implications for the on-going financial sector reforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence-based medicine has greatly influenced decisions and actions throughout the health care industry for a couple of decades, particularly in the advanced countries. However, little is known as to how patients with their tacit knowledge have fitted into the evidence-based medical practice equation especially in the developing world, hence the need for this study. The combined use of the theory of communicative action and the AGIL taxonomy of adaptation, goal attainment, integration, and latent pattern maintenance by Talcott Parsons served as the theoretical framework for the study. The theory of communicative action provided the benchmark in understanding how doctors and patients are motivated to adapt and integrate the explicit and tacit knowledge forms in attaining the goal of quality evidence-based medical practice in line with the AGIL taxonomy. The qualitative interviews with fifty respondents - twenty doctors and thirty patients - in the central region of Ghana are utilized as the data base for the discussion. The study concludes that at present patients' tacit knowledge does not matter in the practice of evidence-based medicine in Ghana. This situation has to be addressed by empowering patients to be actively involved in clinical decision-making affecting their health. This is critical because effective implementation of evidence-based medical practice demands a good blend of explicit and tacit knowledge forms possessed by doctors and patients respectively. It is believed that embracing this strategy of managing knowledge in the health care dispensation holds the potential to bring about improved health care outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the influence of government expenditure and institutions on public debt accumulation and economic growth in Ghana between 1990 and 2019. The paper examines how public debt is utilized for government spending on capital and recurrent expenditure, and the role bureaucratic quality plays in improving economic growth. The employed estimation technique is structural equation modelling because it effectively assesses complex situations and allows the modelling of complex systems by utilizing simultaneous equations, mediator analysis and modification indices to improve the goodness of fit of a model. The study indicates that public debt negatively affects GDP growth, whereas trade openness positively influences GDP growth and public debt accumulation. Bureaucratic quality impacts GDP growth positively and capital expenditure negatively. Recurrent expenditure positively predicts GDP growth and capital expenditure. Capital expenditure's effect on GDP growth is negative but statistically insignificant. The right checks and balances should be implemented to mitigate rent‐seeking and corrupt activities associated with bureaucracy. Tax revenue mobilization should be improved to reduce budget deficits and borrowing, whereas exports should be promoted through improving local industries. Finally, all infrastructural projects must be completed to serve their purpose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whole-genome sequence data for clinically relevant Gram-negative bacteria from the African continent are scarce. In this report, we present the draft genome sequence data and antibiograms of four species, namely, Kerstersia gyiorum, Providencia vermicola, Providencia stuartii, and Alcaligenes faecalis, that were recovered from human soft tissue biopsy samples.