Effect of Public Investment on Private Investment: Evidence from Ethiopia

This study examined the effect of public investment on private investment and their relative effects on Ethiopia economic growth. The study employed the ARDL bounds testing approach. The empirical results revealed that public investment has a crowding-in effect on private investment in the long run which means, public investment stimulates private investment in the long run. However, the study revealed that public investment has a crowding out effect on private investment. In the other word, public investment has no direct impact on economic growth in the long run. However, private investment has a significant positive impact on economic growth in the long run while it is negatively related to economic growth in the short run. This suggests that private investment positively contributes to economic growth more than public investment. In addition, economic growth is positively associated with private investment although it is statistically insignificant in the long run. This implies that it is prudent for policy makers not to cut back on the efficient component of public investment and increase infrastructural public investment to a level that promotes private investment in the long run thereby indirectly fostering economic growth.

Empirical Cost of Electricity Outage on Labour and Capital Productivity in Nigeria

This study empirically examined the impact of electricity power outages on Nigeria’s capital and labour productivity. The emphasis is on how frequent electricity outage reduces labour and capital effectiveness and other factors of production. To achieve the above objective, annual time series data on Total Factor Productivity - a proxy for Nigeria’s factors productivity, Power Outage (electric power transmission and distribution losses as % of output), and other controlled variables were used to estimate the relationship and all data were from World Bank Development Indicators (WDI). The Fully Modified Ordinary Least Square (FOLS) technique was adopted for analysis. The empirical results showed a negative relationship between power outages and factor productivity. The result also reveals that electricity pricing has a significant negative impact on the factor productivity while both electricity generation and population have a significant positive impact on Nigeria’s total factor productivity. The implication is that the substitution effect between labour and capital is positive, meaning that Nigeria exhibits a labour-intensive production function. In conclusion, the study is of the opinion that power outage and electricity pricing negatively impact factors productivity while electricity generation and population have a positive relationship with factors productivity in Nigeria.

Revolving Door Paradox of Textile Industry in Ethiopia: Quantitative analyses of High Labor Turnover

The study aims to assess the determinants of employees’ turnover in the Ethiopian textile industry. To assess the determinants of the problem, a sample of four companies were included in the study from four different Regional States (Tigray, Amhara, Oromia, and SNNPR). The principal sources of the data were employees, key informants, and employers in the textile manufacturing enterprise. A structured questionnaire with CSpro software was used to gather the information. A Probit Econometric Regression analysis was applied to analyze the data and draw a conclusion. The findings of the study revealed that workers’ dissatisfaction with their job, work environment, and salary dissatisfaction have a significant and positive relationship to their intention to leave the companies. However, as expected, supervisors’ good relationship with the workers has a significant effect to reduce the probability of the worker’s intention to leave the company. Compared to males, female workers are more likely to intend to leave. This could be associated with inconvenient work schedule and works stress. The result of the analysis also shows that the larger the family sizes, the less likely are the workers intend to leave their company which could be associated to fear of risk against the family livelihood.

Employee Motivation and Job Performance: Empirical Evidence from Nigeria

This study aims to establish whether there exists a link between employee motivation experiences and job performance. A descriptive research survey was adopted as 206 senior cadre employees of First Bank of Nigeria were sampled using cross-sectional data from a semi-structured questionnaire. The result revealed that both monetary (competitive salary, salary raise, allowances, bonuses, and percentage profit sharing) and non-monetary (job security, job training, career advancement opportunities, flexible working hours, and retirement benefits) motivational incentives have a significant positive correlation with employee job performance in study organization. Specifically, it was revealed that competitive salary (R= 0.809) is the leading monetary motivational factor as job security (R=0.835) tops the ranking for non-monetary motivational factors. It was recommended that study organization will have to employ a mix of both monetary and non-monetary incentives in driving higher performance. Findings also showed that female employees are more motivated by non-monetary incentives (58%) while male employees are more motivated by monetary incentives (61%). Therefore, management should be more strategic in implementing its yearly financial reward contest and public recognition as this will induce the employees to engage in work behaviour that drives higher-level performance.

Relationship between Budget Deficit and Economic Growth: Evidence from Ethiopia

This study examined the relationship between budget deficit and economic growth in Ethiopia using time series data for the period 1991 to 2019 by applying the ARDL bounds testing approach. The empirical results indicate that budget deficit and economic growth in Ethiopia have a negative relationship in the long run, and have a weak positive association in the short run. In line with this, in the long run, a one percent increase in the budget deficit causes a 1.43 percent decline in the economic growth of the country. This result is consistent with the neoclassical view which says budget deficits are bad for economic growth during stimulating periods. Moreover, in the long run, the variables trade openness and inflation have a positive impact on Ethiopian economic growth, and on the other hand, the economic growth of Ethiopia is negatively affected by the nominal exchange rate in the long run. Apart from this, in the long run, gross capital formation and lending interest rates have no significant impact on the economic growth of the country. Therefore, the study recommends the government should manage its expenditure and mobilize the resources to generate more revenue to address the negative impact of the budget deficit on economic growth.

Economic Growth and Quality Adjusted Human Capital Equation: Moderating Role of Social Capabilities in Africa

The role of human capital on economic growth across countries has over time garnered lots of discussion in economic literature. This is fundamental, given that the actual determinant of the difference in income per capita across countries or why some countries are growing faster than other countries has remained an unresolved issue. This study provides a different insight into the nexus between human capital and economic growth by accounting for the role of social capabilities in a panel framework. Specifically, the study covers 40 African countries between 1998-2019, where the General Method of Moment (GMM) was employed to estimate the model. Specifically, it was discovered that without improved legal institutions and better economic opportunities, human capital impact on the growth of income per capita across countries is insignificant though positive. The study concludes that the effectiveness of knowledge accumulation and adoption of technology in a country is hinged on the availability of an enhanced legal, social, and economic environment.

Does Training and Development Impact the Employee Performance or another Ritual

Today’s competitive business environment requires that for organizations to survive the fierce competition in the business environment, the organization must invest heavily on human resources training and development to stay up-to-date on the best industry business practices across the globe. One such way to improve and increase the available skill sets, knowledge, and capabilities of the employee to meet all the important needs of the organization customers is through training and development. Thus, this study evaluates the impacts of training and development on employee performance using quantitative research methods. To achieve the objectives of the study, the research a quantitative research design was employed, and a questionnaire research instrument was used in collecting relevant data from either owners or managers of 260 Small and Medium Scale Enterprises in Lagos Nigeria. The study concludes that both off-the-job and on-the-job training are effective towards improving employee performance and that training and development not only improves the skill set of the employees but also a source of motivation for the employees.

SMEs Intervention Programmes in Nigeria: Evaluating Challenges Facing Implementation

To ensure price and economic stability, the central bank of Nigeria has adopted several unconventional monetary policy measure such as MSMEs credit intervention with the aim of boosting credit availability in specific sector of the economy. The intuition is that rise in productive activities/investment will indirectly promotes price stability the core mandate of the bank. Therefore, this study investigated the challenges facing implementation of real sector (MSMEs) intervention programmes of the CBN since year 2000 to 2020. The study employed mixed method using descriptive survey approach to sample 62 intervention programme implementers and 400 Micro, Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (MSMEs). The findings reveal among others that high loan default risks, politicization of programmes, and inadequate infrastructural development are the leading challenges facing programme implementers in Nigeria. Applicants' non-eligibility in programmes applied for, poor business plan or inadequate knowledge in proposed business topped the reasons for failures among applicant MSMEs. Consequently, a need for more public-private partnerships in programme design, monitoring, and evaluation to forestall political interference is advised.

Employee and Organisational Performance: Employees Perception of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Rewards System.

The study aimed to evaluate the perception of employees on both intrinsic and extrinsic reward system and whether reward system impact their performance and the organization performance at large. To achieve the objective, the study employed Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) approach to test six hypothesis. The study sampled 400 employee of Zenith Bank Plc using questionnaire send to the respondent emails. PLS-SEM result revealed that both extrinsic and intrinsic rewards have positive and significant impact on employee performance, although, extrinsic appear more potent than intrinsic rewards. It was further revealed that three of the four measure of employee performance; quality job, effective service delivery, customer rating has positive significant with organization performance while time management was unable to explain organization performance. We discovered also that gender does not play any significant role on employee performance, but age does. The study therefore concluded that rewards play an important role in both employee performance and organization performance.

Sectoral analysis of foreign direct investment and growth in Nigeria

The study conducted a sectoral analysis of the contribution of foreign direct investment on Nigeria economy between 1980-2019. Time series data from Central Bank of Nigeria and World Bank Development Indicators was used to estimate the relationship using Auto Distributed Lag Model (ARDL). It was revealed that foreign direct investment not only exert a direct positive effect on the aggregate growth rate of Nigeria economy but also exert a positive indirect effect through labour. It was also discovered that agriculture sector is the only sector that does not enjoy significant contribution of foreign direct investment in Nigeria while petroleum and Gas experience the greatest growth attributable to foreign direct investment in Nigeria. The study contributed to literature by not only examining the indirect effect of foreign direct investment on Nigeria aggregate growth rate through labour but also the effect of foreign direct investment on the sector-by-sector growth rate.