Adverse Shocks and Social Protection in Africa: What Role for Formal and Informal Financial Institutions?

This paper presents evidence on the wide range of adverse shocks reported by African households. The current financial and economic crisis adds another layer of risk to al-ready vulnerable households and firms. In responding to an adverse shock, households are involved in a balancing act that is aimed at maintaining consumption and/or assets above critical levels. Households mainly use coping mechanisms that depend on family and other networks and self-insurance. There is limited recourse to public social protection and formal credit and insurance markets. The paper examines some informal financial arrangements. Some of these are not designed to smooth consumption when there is an adverse shock. These informal mechanisms have the potential to be the platform to expand access and utilisation of formal finance particularly in rural communities. There is a clear role for publicly provided interventions. This is because informal risk sharing mechanisms do not cover all shocks. The premium paid may not be adequate to cover the entire financial implications of the shock. Finally, the design of the risk-sharing institutions can result in the very poor being excluded.

Ethnicity and wage determination in Ghana

The authors look at earnings differentials between members ofdifferent ethnic groups, and between employers'relatives, unrelated members of the same ethnic group, and other workers in Ghana's manufacturing sector. They find that a significant proportion of the earnings differentials identified between ethnic groups can be explained with reference to a fairly standard set of observations about workers'characteristics. Labor market segregation along ethnic lines - combined with considerable variation in employers'characteristics (especially educational attainment and family background, possibly because of discrimination in other markets) - accounts for most of the remaining differentials. Northerners earn considerably less than other groups, mainly because they are less educated. The Other Akan earn much more than the relatively low-earning Asante, Fante, and Ewe. There is no evidence of discrimination between ethnic groups, although there is evidence of discrimination in favor of inexperienced workers from the same ethnic group, who can be assessed, and matched with jobs more easily than similar workers from other ethnic groups. Finally, workers who are related to their employers, earn a considerable premium, possibly because they contribute more to productivity than their fellow workers (perhaps through an effect on"esprit de corps"). The authors'results draw attention to some startling differences in educational, and labor market attainment between groups. A strong case can be made for including such issues in the policy debate.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Educational Sciences,Gender and Social Development,Anthropology,Education and Society

Ethnicity and wage determination in Ghana.

This paper looks at earnings differentials between (1) members of different ethnic groups and (2) employers’ relatives, unrelated co-ethnics, and other workers, in the Ghanaian manufacturing sector. We find that a significant proportion of the identified earnings differentials between ethnic groups can be explained with reference to a fairly standard set of observed workers’ characteristics. Labour market segregation along ethnic lines combined with considerable variation in employer characteristics (possibly due to discrimination in other markets) accounts for most of the remaining differentials. There is no evidence of statistical discrimination between ethnic groups, although there is evidence of such discrimination in favour of inexperienced co-ethnic workers, who can be more easily assessed and matched to jobs than similar workers from other ethnic groups. Finally, workers who are related to their employers earn a considerable premium, possibly because they contribute more than their fellow workers to productivity.

Access to basic education in Ghana: the evidence and the issues

This review of educational development in Ghana has been developed to explore key issues in access to education, capture recent research, and to identify gaps in knowledge and understanding. This critical analytic review provides the basis for research which seeks to identify children who are excluded from basic education, establish the causes of their exclusion, and identify ways of ensuring that all children comnplete a full cycle of basic education successfully

Jane Finch Community Research Partnership : November 29, 2016 Symposium Report

The Jane and Finch Community Research Partnership (JFCRP) held a symposium that brought together community residents, organizations, and York University academics on Tuesday November 29, 2016. The gathering addressed challenges in accessing research about or conducted in the Jane and Finch community as well as the ongoing challenging relationship between Jane-Finch and York University around research ethics. The need for a community ethics process is necessary to guide and inform how research is conducted in the community. The day was informed by a JFCRP event held June 2016 and a previous symposium, Connect the Dots, hosted on December 11, 2013.This JFCRP project was funded by the York University-TD Community Engagement Centre Catalyst Fund 2016-2017

Market participation and rural poverty in Ghana in the era of globlization

This paper investigates the factors that influence market participation in rural economies. This is based on the premise that participation in the market is an important channel through which the global economy impacts on the rural areas and can have a positive impact on poverty reduction through increased incomes. A case study approach is adopted using four rural communities in three ecological zones of Ghana. – poverty ; case study ; prices ; markets ; rural econom

Regulating the levels of key factors in cell cycle and DNA repair: New pathways revealed by lamins

Spatial and temporal organization of the genome represents an additional step in the regulation of nuclear functions. The nuclear lamina, a polymeric meshwork formed by lamins (A/C and B type) and lamin-associated proteins, plays a key role in the maintenance of genome localization, structure and function. Specifically, mutations in the LMNA gene encoding lamins A/C or changes in its expression, either upregulation or silencing, are associated with defects in DNA replication, transcription and repair, as well as alterations in epigenetic modifications of chromatin. These data, together with the fact that defects in A-type lamins are associated with a whole variety of degenerative disorders, premature aging syndromes and cancer, support the notion that these proteins operate as caretakers of the genome. However, our understanding of their functions is limited due to the lack of well-defined mechanisms behind the genomic instability observed in lamin-related diseases. Here, we summarize our recent discovery of new pathways that are affected by the loss of A-type lamins. In particular, we found that A-type lamins control transcription and degradation of proteins with key roles in cell cycle regulation and DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) repair by nonhomologous end-joining (NHEJ) and homologous-recombination (HR). Importantly, the proteins regulated by A-type lamins—Rb family members, 53BP1, BRCA1 and RAD51— exert tumor suppressor functions, with their loss being associated with cancer susceptibility. Moreover, our studies revealed novel pathways that contribute to genomic instability and that can be activated in disease states independent of the status of A-type lamins

Credit constraints in manufacturing enterprises in Africa

We investigate the question whether firms in the manufacturing sector in Africa are credit constrained. The fact that few firms obtain credit is not sufficient to prove constraints, since certain firms may not have a demand for credit while others may be refused credit as part of profit maximising behaviour by banks. To investigate this question, we use direct evidence on whether firms had a demand of credit and whether their demand was satisfied in the formal credit market, based on panel data on firms in the manufacturing sector from six African countries. More than half the firms in the sample had no demand for credit. Of those firms with a demand for credit, only a quarter obtained a formal sector loan. In line with expectations, our analysis suggests that banks allocate credit on the basis of expected profits. However, controlling for credit demand, outstanding debt is positively related with obtaining further lending while micro or small firms are less likely to get a loan than large firms. The latter effect is strong and present in the regression, despite including several variables typically referred to as explaining why small or ‘informal’ firms do not get credit. The role of outstanding debt is likely to be a reflection of inefficiency in credit markets, while the fact that size matters is consistent with a bias as well, although we cannot totally exclude that they reflect transactions costs on the part of banks. Finally, we could not detect any differences between countries in the effects of these factors in the credit allocation rule, although financial deepening is found to explain most of the country-specific fixed effects, shifting the probability of obtaining credit across the firm distribution.