Attentiveness to Early Warning Drought Information: Implications for Policy Support and Climate Risk Reduction in Ghana

Successful drought planning is dependent on the generation of timely and accurate early warning information. Yet there is little evidence to explain the extent to which crop farmers pay attention to and assimilate early warning drought information that aids in the policy formulation in support of drought risk reduction. A socioecological survey, using a structured questionnaire administered to 426 crop farming households, was carried out in the Talensi District of the Upper East Region, Ghana. The data analytic techniques used were frequency tables, relative importance index, and multinomial logistics embedded in SPSS v.20 software. The results show that crop farmers predominantly rely on agricultural extension officers for early warning drought information, with an estimated 78% of them paying little to very much attention to the information. The likelihood ratio Chi-square test showed that there is a significant improvement in fit as X2 (20) = 96.792, p < 0.000. Household status, average monthly income, and age were the significant predictors for crop farmers paying no attention at all to early warning drought information, while household status was the only significant factor among those paying a little attention. The drive to build a climate-resilient society with effective early warning centers across Ghana will receive 60% lower support from crop farmers paying no to a little attention as compared to farmers paying very much attention to early warning drought information. Broader stakeholder engagements should be carried out to harness inclusive support from crop farmers to build a climate-resilient society in Ghana.

Assessing Sexual Behavior Patterns among Student Athletes of Senior High Schools in the Upper East Region, Ghana

The purpose of this study was to investigate the sexual behavior patterns of student athletes of senior high schools in the Upper East Region of Ghana and to assess the differences in sexual behavior patterns between male and females. A sample of 400 student athletes using a convenience sampling technique from public senior high schools was drawn to complete a self-designed research study. Descriptive statistics and the Chi-square test tool were used to analyze the collected data. The results showed that student athletes practiced various forms of sexual behaviors such as celibacy, foreplay, vaginal-penile sex, sexual fantasy, masturbation, oral sex, and anal sex. The Chi-square analysis showed significant gender differences in prevalence of masturbation (χ2 (1, n = 400) = 4.6962, probability = 0.030) and sexual fantasy (χ2 (1, n = 400) = 6.8477, probability = 0.009), but not vaginal-penile intercourse (χ2 (1, n = 400) = 1.3197, probability = 0.251) and celibacy (χ2, (1, n = 400) = 0.0721, probability = 0.788). The study concludes that student athletes of senior high schools might be vulnerable to unplanned parenthood and are at risk of STIs, including HIV. Regular health promotion campaigns on sexual risk-taking behaviors are required to help reduce the prevalence of student athletes’ indulgence in risky sexual behavior patterns that can harm their health. It is essential to implement gender-specific interventions (e.g., decision-making skills) when addressing the problems of sexual behaviors among the student athletes in the region.

Investigating the impact of mobile money to well-being from a capabilities standpoint

Using data from the Upper East Region of Northern Ghana, this study examined the influence of mobile money on well-being and development from a competence standpoint. The data reveals that mobile money use has a variety of capability-enhancing effects, ranging from empowerment to engage in the financial system to choice and agency to satisfy multiple functions that lead to higher well-being outcomes in work, health, and education. Erratic power supply and a weak network signal in some places are unfreedoms that must be removed in order for people to benefit from mobile money's enormous potential for well-being and human progress. The long-term reliance on family and social networks for financial assistance is a capability-decreasing element of mobile money. The study's findings indicate the need for development researchers to embrace a diverse and pragmatic conceptualisation of development in information and communication technologies.

The effects of Electronic Salary Paying Voucher System on Undeserved Salary Compensation of Employees within Ghana Education Service

Ghana Education Service is believed to be the department with the highest level of undeserved compensations and other related payroll fraud. This is because the Auditor General Report (2018) noted that Ghana Education Service is the common department for the menace of Salary Grade Mismatches which included some 1,200 employees across board. This paper is born with the purpose of Assessing the Impact of the E-Salary Payment Voucher system and Payroll Headcounts/Audits in the elimination of Unauthorized Compensations in the two Kasena-Nankana Districts of Upper East Region of Ghana. Research questions for the study focused on the relationship between undeserved compensations which is the dependent variable and the independent variables include; payroll audits and the E-Salary Payment Voucher system. This study employed the fraud triangle theory as the basis for its experiment. The study also utilized the non-probability quota sampling method to select 102 users of the E-SPV system for a cross sectional survey in Ghana Education Service. Significant findings of the study include, validators or users of the E-SPV system are partly mandated to protect the public purse and hence the power to allow the prevalence of undeserved compensations is also in their hands. Recommendations emanating from the study seek to unpin that there should be an annual system audit of the Electronic Salary Payment Voucher at various management units to ensure that it reflects the true and fair view of the compensations given to staff at various cost centers in Ghana Education Service.

Impact of Community Health Interventions on Maternal and Child Health Indicators in the Upper East Region of Ghana

BackgroundThis paper reports on results of a health system strengthening programme implementation research in the Upper East region of northern Ghana where critical interventions to accelerate and strengthen the health delivery were implemented. Transformative interventions implemented included empowering community leaders and actors to actively participate in health delivery, strengthening the referral systems through the provision of community transport systems, provision of basic medical equipment to community clinics, and improving the skills of critical health staff training. MethodsA mixed method design was used to evaluate the impact of the interventions. A quantitative evaluation employed a flexible research design to test the effects of various component activities of the project. For these analyses a pre-and-post randomized cluster design was used. For the qualitative data focused group and individual indepth interviews were employed to gauge the views of different stakeholders associated with the implementation process. ResultsSignificant improvements in key maternal and child health indicators such as antenatal and postnatal care coverage (ANC and PNC) were observed. Similarly, there were significant increases in delivering of children in a health facilities and deliveries assisted by skilled health personnel after the intervention compared to before intervention situation in the region. There has also been increased uptake of women providing oral rehydration salts (ORS) for treatment of diarrhoea, as well as marked reductions in upper respiratory infections (URI). Conclusions Results from a pre-and post-evaluation impact assessment of interventions implemented in these health deprived parts of Ghana show that the programme had a strong positive impact on the functioning of Ghana’s health delivery system known as Community-based Health Planning and Services programme and induced visible changes in key indicators of health system performance.