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This paper assesses the impact of constitutional changes on foreign direct investment (FDI) in 49 African countries during the period 1980–2020. The paper uses a dummy variable related to the year of the constitutional change and the number of changes during the study period to capture the frequency of constitutional changes. The results reveal that an increase in the frequency of constitutional changes negatively affects FDI. The negative relationship between constitutional change and FDI is consistent across different measures of constitutional change and FDI and is robust to alternative empirical approaches. These results suggest that frequent constitutional changes may create uncertainty and instability in the investment climate, which may discourage foreign investors from investing in these African countries. The study provides evidence for policymakers that a stable constitutional framework may attract FDI in African countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 2000, Official Development Assistance has played a crucial role in efforts related to the achievement of MDGs. This is especially the case in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) which is the world's largest recipient of foreign aid. This paper assesses the effectiveness of aid and its efficient use in achieving universal primary education in sub-Saharan Africa. The impact of aid is assessed for a sample of 35 SSA countries over the decade 2000-10. The results suggest that higher aid to education significantly increases primary completion rate. This result is robust to the use of various methods of estimation, the inclusion of instrument to account for the endogeneity of aid and the set of control variables included in regressions. Our findings suggest that education aid can be used as a policy instrument to achieve the fourth Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) which is to ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the HIV/AIDS pandemic progresses in Africa, elders are increasingly responsible for the care of orphans. Several reports suggest that elderly Africans do not have the resources to provide care and are at risk of poor health, but few studies have systematically measured health of caregivers. The Kenyan Grandparents Study is a longitudinal study designed to compare elder Luo caregivers to noncaregiving peers. Several measures of health were collected, including body mass index (BMI), blood pressure, glucose, and hemoglobin. In addition, self-perceived health and mental health were measured using the MOS Short-Form 36 (SF-36). It was hypothesized that caregivers would have poorer health than noncaregivers and that the difference in health would widen over the three waves of the study. Caregiving did not affect physical health but did act to decrease mental health and perceived health over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both mtDNA and the Y chromosome have been used to investigate how modern humans dispersed within and out of Africa. This issue can also be studied using the JC virus (JCV) genotype, a novel marker with which to trace human migrations. Africa is mainly occupied by two genotypes of JCV, designated Af1 and Af2. Af1 is localized to central/western Africa, while Af2 is spread throughout Africa and in neighboring areas of Asia and Europe. It was recently suggested that Af1 represents the ancestral type of JCV, which agrees with the African origin of modern humans. To better understand the origin of modern Africans, we examined the phylogenetic relationships among Af2 isolates worldwide. A neighbor-joining phylogenetic tree was constructed based on the complete JCV DNA sequences of 51 Af2 isolates from Africa and neighboring areas. According to the resultant tree, Af2 isolates diverged into two major clusters, designated Af2-a and -b, with high bootstrap probabilities. Af2-a contained isolates mainly from South Africa, while Af2-b contained those from the other parts of Africa and neighboring regions of Asia and Europe. These findings suggest that Af2-carrying Africans diverged into two groups, one carrying Af2-a and the other carrying Af2-b; and that the former moved to southern Africa, while the latter dispersed throughout Africa and to neighboring regions of Asia and Europe. The present findings are discussed with reference to relevant findings in genetic and linguistic studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past decade inclusive growth, that is job-rich growth, has topped the policy agenda in developing countries. This paper investigates how the access to finance affects employment in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Sub-Saharan Africa. It first presents a model where firm creation requires entrepreneurial search and paying the start-up costs, while the firm's size in terms of employment depends on the access to credit. Under the financial market imperfections, access to credit can be a binding constraint on firm entry and employment even when the banks have sufficient liquidity. Using an impact evaluation-based approach on firm-level data from 42 African countries, we show that SMEs with access to formal financing create more jobs than firms without access, with employment in firms having access to more affordable and larger loans growing the fastest. The impact of access to finance is stronger for firms in manufacturing than in services, pointing to sectoral targeting of finance as a possible policy supporting industrialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A study of the pollen content and organic matter of a 6 m long core recovered from the gallery forest alongside the tributary of Lake Petpenoun, not far from its mouth (NW Cameroon, 5°38′29.3 N, 10°38′43.1E, 1120 m asl) documents the evolution of the « Grassfields region » over the last millennium. The exceptional rate of accumulation of the sedimentary series, where the last millennium is 5 m thick, allows to differentiate two distinct periods. Between 900 and 1420 CE, the coring site was located under lake water, reflecting the expansion of the lake under humid environmental conditions during the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA). The coring site then gradually dried up from 1420 CE onward, during the Little Ice Age (LIA). Then, in 1850 CE, modern conditions were established. During the LIA, the lake edge moved about 140 m downstream of the coring site due to drying conditions. The date of 1420 CE corresponds to a major event that affected not only local hydrological conditions but also regional vegetation. The collapse of pollen production shows the general degradation of the landscape due to increased drought conditions. • Environmental changes at Lake Petpenoun (Cameroon) during the last millennium • Humid conditions characterize the MCA and the MCA/LIA transition up to 1420 CE • A major evironmental change occurred around 1420 CE • A gradual drying trend set in during the LIA and ended by 1850 CE. • The modern climate and environment were established by 1850 CE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]