Evaluating How Root Capital’s Client Businesses Impact Smallholder Livelihoods: Oil Palm in Ghana

This evaluation analyzes the extent to which affiliation with an agriculture business supported by Root Capital’s lending and advisory services—in this case, an oil palm aggregator in Ghana called Serendipalm—improves the wellbeing of smallholder farmers. With insights directly from the business’ supplying producers, the report highlights the impacts of affiliation with Serendipalm on farmer livelihoods,…

The State of Youth Health in Ghana’s Construction Industry

Construction work ranks among the three most dangerous occupations in the world (Safe Work Australia 2012). The rapid and dynamic pace of work, high-risk nature of tasks, use of harmful materials and dangerous equipment, and other issues such as personality conflicts and heavy workload expose the construction workforce to significant physical and psychosocial risks (Gunasekaran…

“DIRTY FUEL” INSTITUTIONAL DEFICIENCIES AND IMPLICATIONS

Filling stations are dying in advanced economies like Germany, Canada, Japan and China. This has been attributed to increasing sensitivity about environmental protection in these economies, leading to the rise of more sustainable vehicles or better alternatives of fossil fuel like compressed natural gas. Despite these developments, emerging economies like Ghana remain largely dependent on diesel and…

WOULD A BAN ON PLASTIC BAGS WORK IN GHANA?

The global plastics industry presents a hydra-headed environmental challenge that has remained staunchly established despite insistent appeals from environmentalist and environmentally-concerned organizations over decades. Long accepted as a necessary evil, more plastic has been produced in just the past ten years than was produced during the whole of the last century (Plastic Oceans, 2016), and…

UNDERSTANDING GALAMSEY (ILLEGAL MINING) IN GHANA

Artisanal Small-scale mining (ASM), popularly known as ‘galamsey’ in the mineral-rich country of Ghana, is a fast-growing phenomenon that is present in several other countries with underground mineral resources. Coined from the English phrase, “gather and sell”, galamsey has become a subject of great concern for governmental agencies, the private sector, local community leaders, as…

Knowledge Sharing Workshop On Child Protection

  Transforming research into evidence-based policy and practice Held at Tomreik Hotel on 28th November 2017 Executive Summary Recent reports from research findings stress that the social and economic wellbeing of the average Ghanaian child is dire. It is estimated that poverty affects more children than it affects adults in Ghana. Projections by UNICEF indicate…