DATE: 3-6 AUGUST, 2011 VENUE: UDS, WA

1. Ghana Geographical Association ConferenceTHEME: THE ROLE OF GEOGRAPHERS IN ACHIEVING THE MILLENIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS (MDGs) 1 AND 7: DATE: 3-6 AUGUST, 2011 VENUE: UDS, WA GGA

2. Reducing Rural Poverty towards Achieving the MDG’s in Northern Ghana: Analysis of Strategies, Impact and Challenges of NGO’s PRINCE OSEI-WUSU ADJEI, PhD SETH AGYEMANG, PhD PETER OHENE KYEI, PhD GGA

3. Introduction to presentation • POVERTY KILLS • LET’S KILL • EXTREME POVERTY • TO ACHIEVE THE • MDG’s GGA

4. Introduction to Presentation:POVERTY KILLS, LET’S KILL EXTREME POVERTY TO ACHIEVE THE MDG’s GGA

5. Presentation Outline • Learning objective of this presentation • Overview of the MDG’s • Research problem and objective • Research methods and procedures • Results and discussion • Conclusion and recommendation • Limitation and acknowledgement GGA

6. Learning Objectives of Presentation • Provide an overview of the MDG’s • Expose Conference participants to poverty situation in rural and Northern Ghana • Expose Conference participants to the strategies, impact and challenges of selected NGO’s operating in Northern Ghana GGA

7. MDGs:BackgroundWhat informed the signing of the Millennium Declaration? • Based on the global recognition that… • The world of our time is so divided between the rich and the poor as never before in human history • One-sixth of humanity particularly the young people, women, the aged and children continue to struggle for daily survival in a life and death battle against extreme poverty, diseases, hunger, and environmental catastrophe (UNCDF, 2003). GGA

8. UN Summits and Conferences of the 1990s (Precursors to MDG’s) • E.g. Rio Summit in 1992 UNCED • International community generally agreed on steps to reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development • World Summit for Social Development (Copenhagen 1995) • Poverty eradication, employment and social inclusion • Equity and equality • Shaping the 21st Century (1996) • Halving absolute poverty by 2015 • Geneva 2000 • Better World for all (Nelson, 2007) GGA

9. Millennium Summit • On September 6-8, 2000, building upon a decade of major United Nations conferences and summits, world leaders (189 Member countries including Ghana) came together at United Nations Headquarters in New York to adopt the United Nations Millennium Declaration. • The Declaration committed nations to a new global partnership to reduce extreme poverty by setting out a series of time-bound targets – • with a deadline of 2015 - that have become known as the Millennium Development Goals. GGA

10. What are MDGs? • Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), are long term universally accepted global goals that aim at significantly improving human development by 2015. • The MDGs focus on reducing poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination against women • Initially contained 8broad goals, 18 targets and 48indicators. • Currently (after 2008 UN Review Summit) The 8MDGs are broken down into 21 quantifiable targets that are measured by 60 indicators (UN MDG • REVIEW REPORT, 2008). • Baseline for MDGs 1990: Target for realization by 2015 GGA

11. THE MDGs • Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger • Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education • Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women • Goal 4: Reduce child mortality • Goal 5: Improve maternal health • Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases • Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability • Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development GGA

12. Hopes and vision of the MDG’s • that human development reaches everyone and everywhere. • That UN member nations including Ghanaian youth and children experience a more peaceful, prosperous and just world in which all humanity can live better and safer lives • If these goals are achieved, world poverty will be cut by half, tens of millions of lives will be saved, and billions more people will have the opportunity to benefit from the global economy (Sachs, 2005). GGA

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14. Research Problem • Ghana is making strides in poverty reduction; but there continues to be serious geographical and occupational disparities in the share of poverty reduction efforts • Reduction in Poverty in Ghana has not been geographically (spatially) equitable: • Poverty remains a predominantly Rural phenomenon • The Northern Regions Remain underserved in national poverty reduction agenda and actions • Upper West remains an endemic/ Poverty stricken geographical region needing investigation and policy attention GGA

15. Research Problem • The poverty situation in rural and northern Ghana has attracted the attention of many operational and advocacy NGO’s as partners in grassroots development • Are the strategies of these NGO’s making any impact on poverty and livelihood development to achieve the MDG’s in the underserved areas? • This study sought to investigate the NGO’s Strategies • find out their impact and challenges from beneficiaries’ perspectives GGA

16. RESEARCHER INTERVIEWING A RESPONDENT Poverty is a visible condition in rural Ghana GGA

17. Research Methods and Procedure Sample Selection: • The Study focused on Four Operational NGO’s purposively selected from the Wa West and Tain districts based on their organizational type (whether operational or advocacy NGO) and their number of years of operation • The Four NGO’s selected were PLAN Ghana, Rural Action Alliance Program (RAAP) in Wa West district together with Action Aid and Social Development and Improvement Agency (SODIA) in Tain district. • A sample of 198 beneficiaries were randomly selected for the study from the NGO’s projects’ communities GGA

18. Research Methods conti’ • 104 beneficiary respondents were selected from Wa West District and 94 from Tain based on total number of beneficiaries in the two districts. • In all, 12 villages were involved in the study; eight from Wa West serving as project sites for Plan Ghana and RAAP and four from Tain serving as project sites for Action Aid and SODIA • Wa West Communities selected included: Chebare, Dalanyiri, Dornye, Tampienni, Buli, Chogsia, Wechiau and Woloyiri • Tain communities selected included: Nassana, Bepoase, Nsuhunu and KwameTenten GGA

19. Research Methods cont’ • Data Collection Techniques included questionnaires with both close and open-ended questions, structured interview guide, focus group discussions and participant observation • The mixed methods allowed for triangulation and authentication of data collected • Data analyses were done with descriptive statistics including frequencies, percentages and supported with cross-tabulation, correlation significant at (< 0.01) and transcription of interview data and focus group discussions • Results were generated with the Version 16 of the SPSS Software and presented in the form of text, tables, line and bar graphs GGA

20. Results and Discussion • Strategies of the NGO’s • Basic Means strategies targeting individual households’ livelihood development. • Basic Needs strategies targeting communities’ access to basic social services • Thus, generally, the NGO’s employ an integration of Livelihood development and social service access improvement strategies for poverty reduction in the study communities. GGA

21. Respondents Perceptions on the effectives of NGO’s strategies Effectiveness of NGO’s strategies as perceived by respondents Effectiveness of NGO’s strategies as perceived by respondents GGA

22. Impact of NGO’s Strategies on Respondents’ Productivity Generally respondents perceive improvement in their productivity levels due to NGO’s interventions GGA

23. Impact of NGO’s Strategies on Respondents’ Income levels Generally respondents perceive improvement in their income levels due to NGO’s interventions GGA

24. Correlation coefficients of selected variables GGA

25. NGO’s and Community Participation GGA

26. Key challenges of the NGO’s • Strict adherence of communities to certain cultural practices inimical to community advancement and poverty reduction such as land tenure systems and gender role differentiation rooted within the rural milieu • Transportation and communication barriers to project sites affect project implementation • Inadequate and delays in the release of donor funds affect timely service delivery in the project sites GGA

27. Conclusions and Recommendation • The study has been revealed that improved income, productivity levels of beneficiary households are significant impact of operational NGO’s in the study areas. • However, low level of participation of beneficiaries in the NGO’s strategies’ design and delays in donor funds are among the major challenges inhibiting the effectiveness of NGO’s activities t in the districts. • It is recommended that local government institutions should create enabling environment through infrastructural provision for the NGO’s to combat the manifestations of poverty at the grassroots levels to actualize the MDG’s in rural communities in northern Ghana. GGA

28. Study Limitation and Acknowledgement • Limitation: • The key methodological limitation was the problem of recall of actual values of respondents’ income and productivity levels. To avoid bias, four point likert-scale was used to assess the situation before and after NGO’s interventions • Acknowledgement: The authors acknowledge the contributions of the staff of the selected NGO’s and all beneficiary respondents for their data. We also acknowledge the efforts of Mr. Emmanuel Kullo and Joel Onuro who assisted in the collection of data from the study areas to make this paper possible. GGA

29. THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR ATTENTION GGA