Technical Education, Vocational Training and Industrialisation in Sub-Saharan Africa(SSA)

This study contributes to a deeper understanding and perspective on the current debate on structural transformation in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) by investigating the effect of technical vocational education and training on industrial performance between 1980 - 2018. The panel data used for this study were obtained from World Development Indicators (WDI), International Labour Organization (ILO), United Nations Educational, Social and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and Fraser Institute databases. The empirical results derived from the Instrumental Variable (IV) Two-Stage Least Squares (2-SLS) econometric approach highlighted the important role of Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) as key determinants of industrial performance in SSA. The study found strong and robust relationship between TVET and measures of industrialisation. General secondary education, on the other hand, had a negative effect on industrialisation in SSA. The paper recommends therefore that there is the need for a complete overhaul and revision of the educational system in SSA with more emphasis on TVET in order to meet the required labour demand for industrial needs in the foreseable future.

Sustainable Development Indicators and Their Relationship to GDP: Evidence from Emerging Economies

This paper aims to analyze the metrics the United Nations has set and called the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and their association with the gross domestic product (GDP) in emerging economies. SDGs have been identified to measure healthy development, whereas GDP has historically been used to measure economic health and has been prioritized above many other indicators. This research deploys the feasible generalized least squares (FGLS) and the seemingly unrelated regressions (SUR) on panel data consisting of the five BRIC countries spanning 2000 through 2017 to estimate a regression model that shows the association of SDGs with GDP. The paper concludes that targeting GDP may not lead to achieving overall SDGs.

The Subadult Virtual Anthropology Database (SVAD): An Accessible Repository of Contemporary Subadult Reference Data

The Subadult Virtual Anthropology Database (SVAD) is the largest available repository of contemporary (2010–2019) subadult reference data from around the world. It is composed of data collected from individuals aged between birth and 22 years. Data were collected from skeletal remains (n = 43, Colombia) and medical images (n = 4848) generated at medical examiner’s offices in the United States (full-body Computed Tomography (CT) scans), hospitals in France, The Netherlands, Taiwan (region-specific CT scans), and South Africa (full-body Lodox Statscans), a private clinic in Angola (region-specific conventional radiographs), and a dental practice in Brazil (panoramic radiographs). Available derivatives include individual demographics (age, sex) with standardized skeletal and/or dental growth and development indicators for all individuals from all samples, and segmented long bone and innominate surfaces from the CT scan samples. Standardized protocols for data collection are provided for download and derivatives are freely accessible for researchers and students.

Economic growth and crude oil revenue in Nigeria

This paper investigated how oil revenue and the activities in the oil industry affected the size of income accrue to each Nigerian (Per capita income) from 1980 to 2019. The variables were sourced from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators (WDI), OPEC Statistics, Baker Hughes Rig Count and the central bank of Nigeria statistical bulletin. Using the AutoRegressive Distributional Lag (ARDL) we observed that explorative activities of crude oil in Nigeria positively impacted the size of individual income. The magnitude of the impact was massive irrespective of time; a 1% increase in exploration increases the size of individual income by 0.4786% in the long run and 0.6030% in the short run. The interaction of rigs by output (interaction of rig-count and oil-production) negatively impacted the size of individual income. This implies that the size of individual income in Nigeria is sensitive to the nature of the explorative environment of the Nigerian oil industry.

Rethinking the Prospects of Sustainable Finance and Challenges of Agribusiness Transformation in Nigeria

The chapter explicates the need to rethink the prospects of sustainable finance (SF) for agribusiness transformation in spite of the challenges facing the sector in Nigeria. It extends to highlighting the implications of the nexus on entrepreneurship development. After a triangular data analysis using the world development indicators (2000-2016) and scholarly articles, the authors found that the prospects of SF are enormous: (1) Nigeria has a modest agricultural growth performance in the crop, food, livestock, and cereal production that could support SF; and (2) SF options such as green loans, green bonds, green credit, green investment funds, green mortgage scheme, and other green financial support instruments could be suitable for agribusiness transformation in the country. Also, the content analysis revealed there are 13 challenges facing agribusiness transformation in the country, and these have harmed the vegetation, farmland, and ocean leading to low productivity. The authors contribute to the literature by identifying SF options as a game-changer for agribusiness transformation.

Trade Openness, Foreign Direct Investment and Sustainable Agriculture in Africa

This study applied a panel data of 37 African countries in examining the impact of trade openness and foreign direct investment on sustainable agriculture towards the attainment of the United Nation (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially, SDG-2, with the aim of ending extreme hunger, achieve food security and improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture. Data for the study was sourced from the Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) and World Development Indicators (WDI) of the World Bank, for the period 2005 – 2019. To control for endogeneity, the study engaged the system Generalised Method of Moments (GMM). The result shows that FDI and trade openness have significant negative impact on agricultural sustainability in Africa. This result implies that, increase in FDI may decrease agricultural sustainability by 0.00294%, while increase in trade openness may lower agricultural sustainability by 0.430066 %. Therefore, the study concludes that while trade openness is negative, policy to raise local production towards export promotion should be encouraged. In addition, FDI should be encouraged to augment local employment and investment towards increasing output and productivity in the Africa region.

Developmental losses in young children from pre-primary program closures during the COVID-19 pandemic

The learning and developmental losses from pre-primary program closures due to COVID-19 may be unprecedented. These disruptions early in life, when the brain is more sensitive to environmental changes, can be long-lasting. Although there is evidence about the effects of school closures on older children, there is currently no evidence on such losses for children in their early years. This paper is among the first to quantify the actual impact of pandemic-related closures on child development, in this case for a sample of young children in Chile, where school and childcare closures lasted for about a year. We use a unique dataset collected face-to-face in December 2020, which includes child development indicators for general development, language development, social-emotional development, and executive function. We are able to use a first difference strategy because Chile has a history of collecting longitudinal data on children as part of their national social policies monitoring strategy. This allows us to construct a valid comparison group from the 2017 longitudinal data. We find adverse impacts on children in 2020 compared to children interviewed in 2017 in most development areas. In particular, nine months after the start of the pandemic, we find a loss in language development of 0.25 SDs. This is equivalent to the impact on a childs language development of having a mother with approximately five years less education. Timely policies are needed to mitigate these enormous losses.

Improving the carbonate reservoirs development efficiency on the example of the Tournaisian stage deposits

The article deals with the issue of carbonate strata of complex geological structure development efficiency improving. Such facilities, as a rule, have deteriorated reservoir properties, parameter anisotropy and are complicated by secondary cavernosity. All of these factors affect the recovery efficiency and are often reflected in development indicators. On the example of Tournaisian stage deposits an example of a methodological approach to the development analysis which takes into consideration various geological factors is presented. As a result, various dependencies were obtained, which when taken into account determin the most promising areas in terms of development efficiency. The issues of the waterflooding system efficiency and the ways of its efficiency increasing are considered separately. Keywords: oil fields development; carbonate reservoirs; development efficiency; waterflooding system.

Unraveling the Nexus of Science & Technology Input and Economic Growth through Research & Development (R&D) Indicators in Asia-pacific Region: A Panel Data and Causality Analysis

This paper unravels the critical aspect of science and technology through research and development indicators as sources, drivers, and predictors of economic growth from the perspective of two developing countries, namely: Philippines and Thailand (ASEAN), and two developed economies, namely: Japan and Australia (ASEAN-X) in Asia-Pacific Region. The data set ranges from 1980 to 2019 and is collected from World Development Indicators of the World Bank, Institute for Statistics of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Research and Development (R&D) is a tool for generating new knowledge and serves as input for technological advancement. In the long run, it has been proven that technology can sustain permanent economic development in the economy. In developed economies, the nexus between the aforementioned variables is robust and significant. Thus, the R&D indicators can be used as a predictor of economic growth. However, in developing economies, the nexus of variables involved is negligible and insignificant. Hence, the R&D indicators cannot be effectively utilized as a predictor of economic growth. Furthermore, the study combined the two sets of panel data and a relevant conclusion was drawn. A country-panel regression and causality analysis were performed based on the empirics of macroeconomics.

Growth Elasticity of Poverty in Nigeria: Empirical Analysis

This study examined growth elasticity of poverty (GEP) in Nigeria, using elasticity procedure with data from the 2020 World Bank World Development Indicators and Nigerian National Bureau of Statistics (2020), covering the period 1992-2019. The findings showed 77.1% of the GEP coefficients as positive; signifying failure of economic growth to alleviate poverty in the country. It is therefore imperative for Nigeria to initiate and implement policies covering employment generation, good governance, reduction in all forms of inequalities, functional education, among others for growth to engender poverty reduction among the citizens.