Analysis – Page 608 – MIL Submissions Engine

July 5, 2025

South Africa’s ‘working for water’ programme is meant to lead to skills and jobs: why it’s failing

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Sinazo Ntsonge, PhD Graduate, Department of Economics and Economic History, Rhodes University, Rhodes University

South Africa’s Expanded Public Works Programme is part of its social safety net. It complements the country’s social grants system, which has over 28 million recipients.

The public works programme helps fill a gap for people who fall outside the grant system, especially those who need work experience and skills training if they’re to get a job. These include unemployed young people, women and people with disabilities.

One of the programmes under its umbrella is the Working for Water programme, which was launched in 1995. It was intended to control invasive alien plants so as to conserve water resources, and provide short-term employment and training for people not covered by the grants safety net.

Since its inception, the programme, alongside other interventions targeted at the environment, has created over 200,000 person years of employment – the total number of days people were afforded work. More than half of these employment opportunities have been held by women, and more than 60% by young people under the age of 35 years.

In my PhD research, I examined one of its flagship projects to assess its impact on the long-term livelihoods of beneficiaries. My aim was to determine whether the programme was achieving its intended role as a social protection mechanism.

I found that the way the project was designed limited its potential to foster long-term livelihoods for participants. Long-term livelihoods are defined as the ability to achieve lasting economic stability and growth beyond the scope of the project itself.

One key issue was the inconsistency in the number of workdays participants were assigned, as well as the quality and availability of the skills training they received. Specifically, the training lacked regularity and did not always align with market demands. It left participants without the practical, job-ready skills needed for sustained employment.

This problem was compounded by budget cuts.

Based on my findings, I propose key changes to improve the programme’s effectiveness: the provision of consistent funding and training that’s aligned to labour market needs.

The project

The project I looked at tackles the clearing of invasive Prosopis mesquite trees in the Northern Cape. This has involved clearing nearly 314,580 hectares of invaded land in that province.

Spanning from 2004 to 2018, the project supported over 9,000 beneficiaries across three phases. In phase I (2004–2008), 2,411 people participated; in phase II (2009–2013), 2,861; and in phase III (2014–2018), 3,756.

The project targeted youth, women and people with disabilities. Beneficiaries were spread across various age groups: 36–64 years in phase I, 22–35 and 36–64 years in phase II, and 18–35 years in phase III.

Participants were paid monthly stipends which ranged from R2,900 to R5,000, which is equivalent to approximately US$157 to US$271 – higher than most South African social grants. For comparison, the disability social grant is R2,180 (US$118), the older person’s grant is R2,200 (US$119), the foster child grant is R1,180 (US$64), and the child support grant is R530 (US$28).

I developed an evaluation framework to assess the programme’s impact on the long-term livelihoods of beneficiaries.

The study was carried out over 14 days in 2020, coinciding with the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. With health restrictions in place, the research had to pivot from planned in-person interviews and focus groups to virtual interviews with key stakeholders and an online survey of beneficiaries. The survey gathered data from 33 beneficiaries, while interviews provided valuable insights from project managers overseeing the clearing initiative.

The gaps

I found that the project faced a number of challenges.

Firstly, there was inconsistency in the number of workdays participants were assigned. Given that public works projects aim to alleviate poverty – primarily through stipends – budget cuts forced managers to focus on retaining beneficiaries to ensure they could at least feed themselves. This often meant reducing the number of workdays (from the required 230 days to just 100 days) and scaling back skills training.

Secondly, there were shortcomings in the quality and availability of the skills training they received. Many of the courses offered were short-term or specific to invasive plant clearing, including herbicide application, brush cutter operation and firefighting. This meant it wasn’t relevant to the labour market.

In the Northern Cape, the economy hinges on industries like mining, agriculture, manufacturing and construction. In mining, for example, knowledge of machinery operation, safety protocols and mine supervision is vital. Agriculture needs workers skilled in sustainable farming, irrigation techniques and equipment operation. Manufacturing needs expertise in production line management, welding and machinery operation. Construction projects require workers proficient in project management, site safety and heavy machinery operation.

Given the region’s tourism potential, customer service and tour guiding are valuable. Finally, fostering entrepreneurship through business management and financial literacy can empower individuals to create small businesses. In addition, soft skills such as communication, leadership and teamwork are essential across all sectors for long-term employability.

Many beneficiaries reported cycling through the Prosopis mesquite clearing project repeatedly, without gaining the work experience or skills needed to move into more sustainable jobs in the wider labour market.

Thirdly, budget cuts restricted the availability of resources for both training and work opportunities.

As a result, the initiative fell short of providing participants with the tools necessary for long-term economic success. Their prospects were limited after the project’s conclusion.

Given the findings of my research study, the programme requires a shift in focus and changes need to be made.

What needs to be done

Firstly, funding for projects needs to be consistent. Secondly, training needs to be aligned with labour market needs. And thirdly, there needs to be a structured system for tracking long-term outcomes on the beneficiaries’ livelihoods following their participation.

Without a system to track outcomes, it’s difficult to assess whether the project is equipping participants with skills for employment in the sectors that are driving the local economy.

With these changes the programme can transition from a short-term employment solution to a sustainable intervention that equips beneficiaries with useful, transferable skills that are applicable to a range of sectors. This would ultimately improve their prospects for stable employment and long-term economic security, provided those jobs are available.

Sinazo Ntsonge received funding from the NRM WfW programme, which was administered by the Centre of Excellence for Invasion Biology (CIB) at Stellenbosch University.

– ref. South Africa’s ‘working for water’ programme is meant to lead to skills and jobs: why it’s failing – https://theconversation.com/south-africas-working-for-water-programme-is-meant-to-lead-to-skills-and-jobs-why-its-failing-248694

July 5, 2025

Uganda’s lions in decline, hyenas thriving – new findings from country’s biggest ever carnivore count

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Alexander Richard Braczkowski, Research Fellow at the Centre for Planetary Health and Resilient Conservation Group, Griffith University

For nearly 15 years almost no information was available on the population status of Uganda’s large carnivores, including those in its largest national park, Murchison Falls. These species represent a critical part of Uganda’s growing tourism economy. The country is home to the famed tree-climbing lions, which are much sought after for this unique behaviour. Together, lions and leopards generate tens of thousands of dollars annually from safari viewing and allied activities.

Keeping an eye on the proverbial prize could not be more critical for the country. When wildlife isn’t monitored rigorously, populations can disappear within just a few years, as tigers did in India’s Sariska tiger reserve.

But many people working in conservation discourage monitoring. They argue that a “bean counter” approach to conservation overlooks the funds and actions that save animals. Others simply say that it is a hard thing to do at scale and particularly for animals that are naturally shy, have big home ranges (sometimes over multiple countries), and occur in very low numbers.

Even in a comparatively small African country – Uganda ranks 32nd in size out of 54 countries – how does one cover enough ground to see how populations of carnivores are faring? This has been the challenge of our work in Uganda for nearly a decade now, monitoring African lions, leopards and spotted hyenas.

Our two recent studies in Murchison Falls and six protected areas across the country sought to address the problem by drawing on a wide range of local and international experts who live and work in Uganda. Working with the Ugandan government’s Uganda Wildlife Authority research and monitoring team, we set out to identify and bring together independent scientists, government rangers, university students, lodge owners and conservation managers in the country’s major savanna parks.

We hoped to cover more ground with people and organisations that wouldn’t traditionally work together. Doing so exposed many of these individuals for the first time to the science and field skills needed to build robust, long term monitoring programmes for threatened wildlife.

The result is the largest, most comprehensive count of African lions, leopards and spotted hyenas. We found spotted hyenas to be doing far better than we expected. But lions are in worrying decline, indicating where conservation efforts need to be focused. Beyond that, our count proved the value of collaborating when it comes to generating data that could help save animals.

Our unique approach

Inspired by Kenya’s first nationwide, science-based survey of lions and other carnivores in key reserves, the first important step of this study was to secure the collaboration of the Uganda Wildlife Authority’s office of research and monitoring. Together, we identified the critical conservation stakeholders in and around six protected areas. These are Pian Upe Wildlife Reserve, Kidepo Valley, Toro Semliki, Lake Mburo, Queen Elizabeth and Murchison Falls. Leopards and hyenas occur in some other parks (such as Mount Elgon and Rwenzori National Park) but resource constraints prevented us from surveying these sites.

We had no predisposed notions of who could or would participate in our carnivore surveys, only that we wanted people living closest to these species in the room.

We shortlisted lodge owners, government rangers, independent scientists, university students from Kampala, NGO staff and even trophy hunters. All came together for a few days to learn about how to find carnivores in each landscape, build detection histories and analyse data. We delivered five technical workshops showing participants how to search for African lions in the landscapes together with mapping exactly where they drove.

We also taught participants:

how to identify lions by their whisker spots in high-definition photographs – these are the small spots where a cat’s whiskers originate on their cheeks
how to determine identity in camera trap images of leopard and spotted hyena body flanks
post data collection analysis techniques
a technique to estimate population densities and abundance.

More than 100 Ugandan and international collaborators joined in the “all hands on deck” survey, driving over 26,000km and recording 7,516 camera trap nights from 232 locations spanning a year from January 2022 to January 2023.

Our scientific approach focused on how to achieve the best possible counts of carnivores. In the process we identified some of the biggest shortcomings of previous surveys. These included double counting individual animals and failing to incorporate detection probability. Even worse was simply adding all individual sighted animals and not generating any local-level estimates.

What our results tell us

As expected, our results painted a grim picture in some areas, but marked hope for others.

In the majestic Murchison Falls national park, through which the River Nile runs east-west, we estimated that approximately 240 lions still remained across some 3,200km² of sampled area. This is the highest number in Uganda and at least five to 10 times higher than in the Kidepo and Queen Elizabeth parks.
In Queen Elizabeth national park, home to the tree-climbing lions, we found a marked decline of over 40% (just 39 individuals left in 2,400km²) since our last survey in 2018.
In the country’s north, Kidepo Valley, the best estimate is just 12 individual lions across 1,430km², in stark contrast with the previous estimate of 132 lions implemented nearly 15 years ago.

In contrast, leopards appeared to continue to occur at high densities in select areas, with Lake Mburo and Murchison Falls exhibiting strong populations. Pian Upe and Queen Elizabeth’s Ishasha sector recorded the lowest densities.

Spotted hyenas have proven far more resilient. They occur at densities ranging from 6.15 to 45.31 individuals/100km² across surveyed sites. In Queen Elizabeth, their numbers could be rising as lion populations decline, likely due to reduced competition and ongoing poaching pressure targeting lions.

These findings underscore the urgent need for targeted conservation interventions, particularly for lions in Uganda’s struggling populations.

Value beyond numbers

Our approach shared the load of data collection, and gave people an opportunity and skills to engage in wildlife science. For many emerging conservationists in the country, this was their first chance to be authors on a scientific paper (an increasingly important component of postgraduate degree applications). Even if many of the people we worked with disagree on how to save large carnivores in Uganda, they could at least agree on how many there are as they had a hand in collecting the data and scrutinising it. Since we have embraced a fully science-based approach, we recognise that our surveys too should improve over time.

Aggrey Rwetsiba, senior manager, research and monitoring at Uganda Wildlife Authority, contributed to the research on which this article is based.

Duan Biggs receives funding from Northern Arizona University and is a member of the IUCN (World Conservation Union).

Alexander Richard Braczkowski and Arjun M. Gopalaswamy do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Uganda’s lions in decline, hyenas thriving – new findings from country’s biggest ever carnivore count – https://theconversation.com/ugandas-lions-in-decline-hyenas-thriving-new-findings-from-countrys-biggest-ever-carnivore-count-249724

July 5, 2025

Accra is a tough city to walk in: how city planners can fix the problem

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Seth Asare Okyere, Visiting lecturer, University of Pittsburg and Adjunct Associate Professor, Osaka University, University of Pittsburgh

Humans are walking beings. Walking is intrinsically linked to our physical development from childhood and enables our connections with people and places. We can say it is essential to our physical and mental well-being.

Walking can also help create inclusive and sustainable cities. Most western cities incorporate this need in their spatial planning.

In African countries like Ghana, however, the fact that most people walk doesn’t always mean they prefer to. They need to walk because it’s cheaper than using motor vehicles. But many African cities are not friendly to pedestrians.

More than 70% of the urban population in Africa walk daily for various purposes. To deal with the challenges pedestrians encounter, some African cities have incorporated policies and strategies for walking into their motorised transport policies. For instance, in Nigeria, the Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority has developed a policy that aims to create a safe and pleasant network of footpaths, greenways and other facilities that serve everyone in the city.

In Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), a similar policy was developed. Its objective is to increase the number of people who walk by investing in walking facilities and improving connectivity to public transport.

The strategies in these documents are commendable, but they have met practical challenges like funding, public perception and technical capacity.

Ghana also has several transport and local development planning policies. Yet most urban areas in Ghana don’t have walking infrastructure and a safe walking environment.

As scholars interested in sustainable urban development planning and policy, we reviewed some of these policies to explore how they treat walking as a way of getting around. The research also assessed institutional perspectives and residents’ everyday lived experiences of walkability in Accra, the capital city. We found that both policies and urban plans paid little attention to making the walking experience enjoyable.

The study

The Ghana Transport Survey Report indicates that over three-quarters (75.3%) of the country’s population make up to ten daily trips on foot, and most urban areas lack walking infrastructure. Pedestrians account for about 42% of road deaths in Ghana.

We chose two study sites in Accra, the capital, where many come to find work. The sites represented inner-city and suburban areas. The research used in-depth and semi-structured interviews with 80 people to capture the perspectives of institutional representatives and community residents. We explored walking experiences in terms of accessibility, safety and enjoyment.

Findings

Accessibility: The national transport policy seeks to provide dedicated, safe, reliable and appropriate facilities for users across all transport modes. What we found, however, was an absence of infrastructure to enhance pedestrian access to facilities and services.

One resident commented:

The roads are not only in poor condition but they have no sidewalks. It is not hard to assume that these were built for car owners, not pedestrians’ everyday use.

Safety: The research revealed a chasm between policy ambitions for walking and realities at the community level. Municipal development plans don’t say how they will address the frequent crashes that result from commuters, vendors and motorists competing for space. The most at risk are pedestrians, who represent 42% of transport-related fatalities. This is because of noncompliance with bylaws that regulate activities on the roads and pedestrian pathways.

One municipal official said:

Look at the streets: Motorists, street vendors, school children on the same street space. There is encroachment, reckless driving, illegally parked cars on road shoulders. School children and the disabled face constant risks. But the plan aims to make the neighborhoods walkable. Just words as always.

Enjoyment: Enjoyment was the least considered aspect of walkability in both national policy and municipal development plans. The absence of facilities and infrastructure that offer comfort, aesthetics and other pleasures for pedestrians provides a clear indication of this.

A community leader complained:

Flooding and poor sanitation create an unpleasant walking environment. Clogged waste, poor drains, and rubbish along streets and alleyways are a problem. There is nothing pleasant about walking: the smell, the dust, the noise and the heat. You walk because you have no choice.

Towards cities that are walkable

The deep gulf between what the policies say and everyday experiences in our study calls for new ways of thinking and implementation within the urban transport in Ghana’s development planning regime.

We suggest that there is a need for transport planners, urban and development planners, and policymakers to consider coproduction strategies in identifying, framing, developing, and implementing interventions. This will help harness the potential for walking as a social equaliser and its contribution to healthy, safe, equitable cities and communities.

Here, action-oriented collaborative strategies like workshops that consider communities as partners can transition African urban residents from captive walkers to walkers who enjoy it.

Seth Asare Okyere receives funding from the Volvo Research and Educational Foundations.

Daniel Oviedo receives funding from University College London and the Volvo Research and Educational Foundations.

Louis Kusi Frimpong receives funding from the Volvo Research and Educational Foundations (VREF) funding program

Mariajose Nieto receives funding from Volvo Research and Educational Foundation

Matthew Abunyewah and Stephen Leonard Mensah do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Accra is a tough city to walk in: how city planners can fix the problem – https://theconversation.com/accra-is-a-tough-city-to-walk-in-how-city-planners-can-fix-the-problem-253636

July 5, 2025

Kenya’s decision to make maths optional in high school is a bad idea – what should happen instead

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Moses Ngware, Senior Research Scientist, African Population and Health Research Center

Kenya’s education ministry announced in March 2025 that mathematics would be an optional subject in senior secondary school, which begins in grade 10. Most students in this grade are aged 15 years. The education minister said the mathematics taught from grade 4 to grade 9 was sufficient for foundational “numeracy literacy”.

The change, in January 2026, is part of a shift to a new education system styled as the competence based curriculum. The decision is not to scrap maths altogether but rather to make it optional. However, given the poor performance in this subject, it is expected there will be few takers.

Maths is a compulsory subject in the first 12 years of basic education in many African countries. This is the case in Mauritius, Nigeria and South Africa, which opted for a choice between maths and mathematical literacy for grades 10-12.

The older education system, known as 8-4-4, featured eight years of primary school and four each at high school and university. Under this, core maths, dubbed Alternative A, is compulsory for all schoolgoing children until the second year of high school (form 2). Most students in this grade are aged 16 years. In the final two years of high school, one has the option of switching to Alternative B, a simplified version of Alternative A introduced in 2009. Alternative B is similar to South Africa’s mathematical literacy subject.

@222222The decision has triggered heated debates in the country, in favour and against.

As a researcher who has taught high school maths and researched maths teaching for over 20 years, I have the view that making maths optional is not a good idea. This is because both individuals and society need maths, regardless of the career path they might choose.

It’s been argued that the change applies to the last two senior years of high school, which was the case in the old system too. For the new curriculum, however, this should not have been a problem as it is competence-based. This implies that what matters is the specific skills and knowledge mastered by a student, and not the examination scores.

The Kenyan education department should establish the root causes of the low performance in maths, and fix them. Research shows that chief among these are resource allocation; weak teacher preparation and support for foundational numeracy instruction; a learning disability known as dyscalculia; and the behavioural performance of maths teachers.

Kenya’s maths problem

In the 2022 Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education exams, graded between A (highest) and E (lowest), over half of the 881,416 candidates’ maths scores fell in the lowest two grades, D and E. This improved only marginally in 2023. To put the performance in context, the pass rate in high school certificate maths examinations in Mauritius improved from 81.4% to 91.8% between 2019 and 2022.

There are a number of reasons for this dismal performance in Kenya:

Resource allocation: The better-resourced national schools can only admit a small number of students, leaving out over 70% who join low-resourced day schools. Resources for learning maths range from teachers to interactive teaching and learning materials inside the classroom. With the support of partners such as the Global Partnership for Education, the government aims to achieve a 1:1 textbook-per-student ratio goal. However, the flow of capitation grants to secondary schools has been wanting, jeopardising access to resources at the school level.

Teacher preparation: Teachers aren’t well prepared to support learners in foundational numeracy (maths in early grades). Foundational numeracy skills are critical in creating strong building blocks for future learning and success in later grades.

Teacher behaviour: Classroom observation studies reveal that maths teachers favour boys. Furthermore, above average learners sit in the front closer to the chalkboard, and learners are denied positive reinforcement that would motivate them to learn maths. There are also negative attitudes about maths as a difficult subject, reinforcing the stereotype that it is only suitable for boys and “bright” children.

Dyscalculia: Worldwide, 3%-7% of the general population are affected by a disability known as dyscalculia. In Kenya, 6.4% among primary and secondary school children have the disability. It is a condition that affects a person’s ability to understand numerical concepts. By implication, the number of the 962,512 Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education candidates of 2024 with this disability works out to between 28,000 and 68,000 candidates. But Kenya’s education system doesn’t support teachers in diagnosing learners with dyscalculia, or managing their disability.

Policy options

There are alternatives to making maths an optional subject in senior secondary school.

The system needs to focus on the root causes of low performance, and then on how to fix them.

I suggest the following solutions.

Avoid unnecessarily using achievement in maths to determine access to academic and training programmes. This way, one’s career will not solely be determined by performance in maths.
Keep a simpler maths alternative, or maths literacy, for senior secondary instead of making maths optional.
Teachers should continue to develop their competence in maths, focusing on content knowledge as well as knowledge of how to teach numeracy.
The general public should communicate effectively to eliminate negative stereotypes and unhelpful attitudes in society. The aim is to shift mindsets so that maths is perceived as part of life – making it necessary to support all children to succeed in maths.
Help learners to overcome dyscalculia, using multisensory teaching approaches – a way of teaching that engages more than one sense at a time: sight, hearing, movement and touch.

Moses Ngware receives funding from the African Population and Health Research Center. He is affiliated with the African Population and Health Research Center.

– ref. Kenya’s decision to make maths optional in high school is a bad idea – what should happen instead – https://theconversation.com/kenyas-decision-to-make-maths-optional-in-high-school-is-a-bad-idea-what-should-happen-instead-252965

July 5, 2025

Teachers in South African schools may be slow to report rape of girls: study shows why

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Ayobami Precious Adekola, Postdoctoral Researcher, University of South Africa

In South Africa, the age of consent for sex is 16 years old. Engaging in sexual activity with someone under the age of 16 is considered statutory rape, even if the minor consents as defined under the law that applies to adults.

In December 2021, South Africa’s Department of Basic Education introduced a policy aimed at reducing the country’s high rates of teenage pregnancy and sexual exploitation. It requires educators to report cases where older sexual partners impregnate learners under 16 years of age.

We are researchers in sexual and reproductive health who have been working on a decade-long community engagement project focused on improving HIV prevention and related challenges among learners. The project is in the Vhembe district of Limpopo province, South Africa, bordering Zimbabwe. Sexual health practices among young people here remain a pressing concern, due to high rates of unprotected sex, sexually transmitted infections, HIV and unplanned pregnancies.

As part of the project, we conducted a study of the statutory rape reporting policy for schools. It showed a disconnect between the policy’s intent and implementation. We found that some rural teachers were unaware of the policy, were not sure what they were supposed to do, or faced cultural, social and systemic barriers that left them feeling powerless to act.

The result is that the child protection law is failing the learners it was designed to safeguard.

Because teachers are often some of the first adults to become aware of statutory rape cases, it’s crucial to equip them to deal with disclosures appropriately, navigate reporting protocols confidently, and engage support systems effectively and help prevent future sexual abuse of learners.

Lack of awareness of policy

Our research was conducted at eight public primary and high schools in the Soutpansberg North school circuit of Limpopo. All the schools are in rural, under-resourced and poor communities. There is a high number of HIV infections and unplanned teenage pregnancies in the schools where the study was conducted. The true incidence rate of rape is different because it’s not always reported.

We engaged 19 educators (16 of them female) through group discussions.

Teachers expressed confusion and frustration over the lack of formal communication and training on the statutory rape reporting policy. Some were unaware that such a policy existed. One admitted:

Honestly, I wasn’t even aware that we had a policy on statutory rape. It’s not something we’ve ever discussed in our school.

Another teacher said:

I know there’s a policy, but I’m unsure where to find it or exactly what it says. As educators, we need to be informed about policies, but it feels like no one communicates them effectively to us.

Cultural and socioeconomic barriers

Beyond a lack of awareness, the discussions suggested that socio-cultural norms hinder the implementation of the statutory rape policy in rural areas.

The study highlighted that intergenerational relationships are normalised in some rural communities. In these cases, families may depend financially on the older male partner, making them reluctant to report such relationships as criminal offences.

In some cases, families tacitly support relationships between young girls and older men in exchange for financial support, making such arrangements difficult to challenge.

A participant shared:

It’s difficult because some parents tolerate these relationships as normal and support their kids to sleep with older men, who in turn provide for the family.

Teachers encounter immense social pressure when faced with statutory rape cases. In tight-knit rural communities, reporting a case could mean accusing a neighbour, relative, or local authority figure. This creates a moral dilemma for educators who want to protect learners but fear community backlash.

As one participant put it:

If I report it, they might turn against us.

These socio-cultural dynamics create a culture of silence that protects perpetrators rather than victims.

What’s missing

The study also found that a lack of training on statutory rape policies is a barrier to effective implementation. Teachers reported feeling unprepared to handle the legal and emotional complexities of reporting statutory rape cases.

There’s been no training at all. We hear about the policy, but they don’t teach us how to implement it or what steps to take if something happens.

Another teacher added:

There is no formal memo from the circuit office and from our school governing body meetings; it was never introduced as an agenda item.

The absence of confidential reporting mechanisms further complicates the situation. Teachers fear that reporting cases could lead to retaliation from the community or even threats to their safety. The lack of a standardised anonymous reporting system leaves teachers feeling vulnerable and unsupported.

Teachers indicated that fear of community backlash led them to prioritise managing learner pregnancies over investigating potential rape cases. Some said it was the parents’ responsibility to report rape.

Proposed solutions

We recommend a few ways to improve reporting of statutory rape:

Mandatory training for educators: The education department should ensure that all teachers understand their legal obligations and know how to navigate reporting procedures.

Confidential reporting systems: Establishing secure and anonymous reporting channels.

Community awareness campaigns: Programmes to help shift harmful cultural norms and make it easier to report statutory rape. Campaigns should emphasise the importance of protecting minors and the legal consequences of statutory rape.

Interdisciplinary support networks: Schools should collaborate with social workers, legal professionals, and mental health experts to provide educators with the support and resources needed to handle statutory rape cases.

Bridging the gap between South Africa’s statutory rape policy and what actually happens in rural areas is a social justice imperative that affects the most vulnerable members of society.

Azwihangwisi Helen Mavhandu-Mudzusi receives funding from the South African Medical Research Council for this study.

Ayobami Precious Adekola does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Teachers in South African schools may be slow to report rape of girls: study shows why – https://theconversation.com/teachers-in-south-african-schools-may-be-slow-to-report-rape-of-girls-study-shows-why-253992

July 5, 2025

30 years of free basic education in Ghana: a report card

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Pearl S. Kyei, Senior lecturer, University of Ghana

Ghana, like many sub-Saharan Africa countries, began investing substantially in free education three decades ago. This led to an increase in the number of children that attend primary school. But what has the impact been on learning outcomes?

The Conversation Africa spoke to demographer Pearl Kyei, who, with economists Fred Dzanku and Samuel Annim, has researched population literacy and numeracy in Ghana after three decades of free education.

How long has Ghana offered free basic education?

Ghana introduced what it calls the Free Compulsory Universal Basic Education (FCUBE) programme in 1994. This meant that families could send children to public schools without paying school fees. In 2005, it introduced the Capitation Grant Scheme to further reduce financial barriers to education and increase access. The grant was to discourage schools from charging unapproved fees and levies to make up for the lost tuition fees.

Basic education in Ghana currently covers the pre-primary, primary and lower secondary levels. Pre-primary involves two years of kindergarten (for ages 4 and 5 years), primary is six years (for ages 6 to 11 years), and lower secondary is three years of junior high school (for ages 12 to 14 years). After junior high school, students have the option to continue to senior high, technical or vocational school (for ages 15 to 17 years).

Several other countries on the continent, such as Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, have put in place free basic education policies too. This is due to the adoption of the Continental Education Strategy for Africa (2016 – 2025) which references the post-2015 commitment of African governments to provide a basic education of 10 to 12 years and to provide at least one year of free pre-primary education.

How is the policy implemented?

Ghana’s 1992 constitution states that “basic education shall be free, compulsory and available to all”. From 1994, primary and junior high schools had to provide fee-free tuition. Financial support from government was later introduced (capitation grants) to compensate public schools for the loss of fees.

The Capitation Grant Scheme provides money to schools each term to help cover costs. The government gives a set amount of money per student to public schools every year. This money is distributed to public schools based on the number of enrolled students, and each student receives a specific amount of money under the grant. This amount is in addition to the main education budget. The 2024 Mid-Year Budget Review reported that the capitation grant was GH₵ 15 per child (approximately US$1) per term in 2024.

Is it working?

Since the introduction of the 1994 free schooling programme, Ghana has recorded substantial increases in enrolment rates at the basic education level.

Research shows there are several problems, however. These include:

All these are likely to affect the quality of education and learning outcomes of students.

What has the impact been on outcomes?

We conducted research to understand whether people’s basic reading and math skills in Ghana had improved over time after many years of expanding education. The study compared groups with similar levels of schooling using two national surveys taken 10 years apart to find out if there had been a meaningful change in basic reading and math skills.

We used data from two nationwide Ghana Living Standards Surveys, conducted in 2006 and 2017. During the data collection, interviewers used flashcards to measure the basic reading and math skills of survey respondents. Persons aged 11 or older were shown flashcards. To answer “yes” to questions about whether they could read or solve written calculations, they had to read a sentence fully and answer a simple math problem correctly.

In the study we defined “basically literate” as being able to read a short English sentence, and “basically numerate” meant being able to solve a simple written math problem. The sample for our study comprised 25,424 and 42,376 persons in 2006 and in 2017 respectively.

We found that the percentage of persons 11 years and older in the sample who have never attended school declined from 28% in 2006 to 16% in 2017. But there was a decline in literacy and numeracy for persons with basic education.

The observed decline was larger for math than for literacy. For instance, those with upper primary education (class 4 to 6) were 14% less likely to be able to correctly read a short sentence in 2017 compared to 2006. For math, the likelihood of persons with upper primary education correctly solving the math problem was 25% lower in 2017.

The study additionally found that basic literacy and numeracy declined more in urban areas than in rural areas at the lower and upper primary levels. Trends for males and females were largely similar.

How can it be improved?

Our findings suggest that without focusing on investments that maintain quality as enrolment increases – like hiring well-trained teachers, providing enough funding, and supplying schools with adequate materials – free education programmes could lead to long-term declines in learning outcomes.

Such declines in basic literacy and numeracy would likely have a negative effect on job productivity, the economy, and social inclusion in the long run.

So there is a need to invest more in quality education to go along with increased access. These investments would help students acquire the foundational skills they need and ensure that free education leads to lasting improvements in skills that are crucial for national growth.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. 30 years of free basic education in Ghana: a report card – https://theconversation.com/30-years-of-free-basic-education-in-ghana-a-report-card-253993

July 5, 2025

The Conversation Africa’s first 10 years: a story of new media powered by generosity

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Candice Bailey, Strategic Initiatives Editor

Starting from scratch is daunting. And exhilarating. Your heart pounds, you can taste adrenaline, the sense of urgency and anticipation makes you high. I can recall each of these sensations 10 years after the thrilling moment when The Conversation Africa went live, and our first newsletter was sent out. Thanks to some nifty software, we were able to watch readers open their emails in real time in cities and towns in South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal, Malawi, Zimbabwe as well as beyond in the US, the UK, India, France, Japan and Australia.

We’d gone live. People were reading us. We’d launched and there was no going back.

It was a tiny team that celebrated the moment: nine of us in an office in Johannesburg plus two colleagues from TC Australia who’d flown over to show us the ropes. Our promise when we launched was that we would “work with academics across Africa and internationally to bring informed expertise to a global audience”.

It’s a promise we’ve kept. From a small team in an office in Johannesburg we’ve gone on to open offices in Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana and Senegal. We’ve published 11,775 articles about African research, written by 7,540 academics, attracting over 180 million reads, helped by 935 republishers.

It’s a model that works because of the generosity of donors, universities, academics and readers. And because we offer evidence-based insight you can trust.

In retrospect the whole idea might have seemed mad. The impact of the 2008 financial crisis was still being felt. Nobody was in an expansive mood: governments were cutting budgets, economic growth was slow. At the time the media landscape was in bad shape as more titles hit the wall and those that elected to keep going were shrinking their operations.

What tipped the balance to go for it was that The Conversation offered the opportunity of building – at scale – a partnership between academics and journalists anchored on the simple premise that researchers would be the writers, and the journalists would be the editors.

The second factor was that the prototype had been built and was working extremely well. Four years prior to our launch The Conversation Australia (the mothership) had gone live. This was followed by editions in the UK, then in the US.

All three were incredibly successful. It was clear to me that tapping into the vast world of academic research as the primary source of articles, and coupling this with the skills of journalists trained as editors, was a winning formula. Academics were keen to write (without being paid), there were journalists eager to apply their editing skills, and media outlets were hungry to pick up articles put out under a Creative Commons licence.

The “why” all made sense. The “how” proved to be trickier.

Money was a problem. The university sectors in other regions were the mainstay of the earlier editions. But universities on the continent were cash-strapped and hardly in a position to bankroll our endeavour. The answer was two-fold: find donors that were supporting the higher education sector in the hope that they would see the merits of the project; and secondly, ask universities for support, either in the form of money or by offering us rent-free accommodation.

Both strategies worked. We raised enough cash to pay for the small team based in rent-free offices at the University of the Witwatersrand.

The second tricky bit was fulfilling the promise of being The Conversation Africa. An office in Johannesburg wasn’t going to cut it. We set about finding more money so that we could expand our footprint. By 2017 our team could boast a colleague in Kenya working from an office gifted by the African Population and Health Research Centre. It took another two years to fulfil the promise with colleagues in Lagos (in an office at the Nigerian Academy of Sciences) and a colleague in Accra. The final piece of the puzzle fell into place with the launch of TC Afrique in 2023 with a team of two in Dakar.

I put The Conversation Africa’s success down to generosity. The generosity of spirit of my colleagues. The generosity of donors. The generosity of universities. The generosity of academics who have volunteered to share their knowledge and approached the rigours of our editing with grace and forbearance. And finally the generosity of you, our readers, who express your appreciation in a host of different ways, not least by sharing articles you come across far and wide. Thank you.

It’s been a remarkable and hugely fulfilling 10 years. The Conversation Africa has established itself as the source of articles you can trust. A rare commodity in these tricky times. Please continue to support us. We need you in our corner.

– ref. The Conversation Africa’s first 10 years: a story of new media powered by generosity – https://theconversation.com/the-conversation-africas-first-10-years-a-story-of-new-media-powered-by-generosity-256011

July 5, 2025

Does free schooling give girls a better chance in life? Burundi study shows the poorest benefited most

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Frederik Wild, Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Heidelberg

Teenage pregnancy rates remain high across many parts of the developing world: In Africa, on average, about one in ten girls between the ages of 15 and 19 has already given birth. These early pregnancies often come with serious consequences for young mothers and their children. They are linked to lower education levels, poorer health outcomes, and reduced economic opportunities.

Scientists, development agencies and NGOs have long heralded education as a powerful tool to reduce early childbearing. Education may directly influence women’s reproductive behaviour, but it can also improve their employment and income-generating opportunities, leading them to postpone pregnancy.

But does access to basic education for young girls result in such successes uniformly across population groups?

We are economists who conducted a study to explore the effect of primary school education on fertility and its related outcomes in Burundi. A bold education reform took place in that country in 2005: the government abolished formal school fees for primary education. As a result, many children who had been excluded from school by cost were able to get a basic education.

The free primary education policy displays a natural experiment for researchers interested in the effects of education. Because the reform applied only to children young enough to be in school, we could compare girls who were eligible for free schooling with those who were just too old to be eligible (but similar in other ways). This allowed us to track the policy’s direct and causal effects.

Indeed, we see that Burundi’s free primary education policy increased educational attainment of women by 1.22 years on average. Our findings also provide new, robust evidence that education can reduce downstream effects, as we see teenage childbearing reducing by as much as 6.9 percentage points. In other words, while about 37% of teenage women who did not benefit from free primary education had given birth before the age of 20, only 30% of those eligible for free primary education had done so.

Importantly, and new in our findings, education conferred the greatest benefit to girls from the poorest segment of society. Our study thereby underscores an important lesson for policymakers: education policies can be highly effective, but not necessarily for everyone in the same way.

A natural experiment in Burundi

We used nationally representative data from Burundi’s Demographic and Health Surveys to establish the effects of education. We compared women born between 1987 and 1991 to those born between 1992 and 1996 – aged 14-18 and 9-13 respectively when the free school policy took effect. We applied modern econometric techniques to identify the increase in years of schooling induced by the policy. We then examined the effect of this increase in schooling on girls’ outcomes, including teenage pregnancy, literacy, and the likelihood of working for cash income, among other outcomes.

The results were striking. Girls who had been young enough to benefit from free schooling gained, on average, 1.22 more years of education thanks to the programme. That corresponds to a 34% increase in the years of education compared to similar women who missed out on the policy. Crucially, this increase occurred across the board – both poor and wealthier women gained more education.

But there was a twist: only young women from poor backgrounds seemed to reap broader benefits from that extra schooling.

For girls from very low-income households, one additional year of schooling reduced the likelihood of becoming a teenage mother by nearly 7 percentage points.

It also decreased their desired number of children and boosted their literacy and chances of working for a cash income outside their own home. These are all powerful indicators of women gaining autonomy and making more informed reproductive choices.

While girls from wealthier households experienced an increase in education too, this additional schooling showed no measurable effect on fertility, literacy, or employment outcomes for them. Thus, we did not find any statistically significant impact of increased schooling for these girls.

In other words, the free primary education programme in Burundi increased the number of years of education for girls in general but the downstream effects of that education appear to have materialised only for the very poor.

Why does household wealth matter?

Why would women from the relatively wealthier families not benefit equally from more education?

One reason could be that somewhat wealthier households had already ensured higher levels of education for their daughters, even before school fees were abolished in Burundi. The education reform thus made less of a difference in their lives. Very poor families, on the other hand, were far more likely to be constrained by the costs of primary education. When that barrier was removed, their daughters could finally access schooling, and this had transformative effects also for sexual and reproductive health.

For the most disadvantaged, education is more likely to open up new economic opportunities. We found that policy-induced education increased their likelihood of working outside of their own household for a cash income, which raises the opportunity cost of early childbearing. The classic economic theory by Nobel prize laureate Gary Becker and Jacob Mincer suggests that when women have better employment prospects, they are more likely to postpone childbirth. And they invest more in their children but tend to have fewer of them. This is precisely what we observed in our data.

Education also seems to empower women by increasing their knowledge and capacity to access information. We found that literacy rates among poor women rose significantly with each added year of schooling. Another prominent theory in the literature on education is that educated women are more likely to understand and use contraception, make informed reproductive decisions, and challenge traditional gender norms.

Rethinking one-size-fits-all policies

Our study underscores an important lesson for policymakers: education policies can be highly effective, but not necessarily for everyone in the same way.

When evaluating the success of reforms like free primary education, we must go beyond average effects. Aggregated data can mask substantial differences between population groups. If we had only looked at average outcomes, we might have concluded that free schooling had little effect on teenage childbearing. But by disaggregating our data by household wealth, we see a different and far more hopeful picture. Free schooling has powerful effects – if we know where to look.

Frederik Wild received funding from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation), EXC 2052/1 – 390713894 for the research paper referenced in the article. The views expressed in this article are solely my own and do not represent those of my employer or affiliated organizations.

David Stadelmann received funding from Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation), EXC 2052/1 – 390713894.

– ref. Does free schooling give girls a better chance in life? Burundi study shows the poorest benefited most – https://theconversation.com/does-free-schooling-give-girls-a-better-chance-in-life-burundi-study-shows-the-poorest-benefited-most-253634

July 5, 2025

Uganda’s tax system is a drain on small businesses: how to set them free

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Adrienne Lees, Researcher, Institute of Development Studies

Uganda is one of the countries most exposed to recent cuts in international aid, particularly with the dissolution of the US Agency for International Development (USAID). In 2023, about 5% of gross national income – a measure of a country’s total income, including income from foreign sources – was received in aid.

The cuts have given new impetus to the drive to increase taxes raised from domestic businesses.

Less than half (45%) of the Ugandan budget is financed through domestic revenue. The remainder is funded largely through debt and budget support (grants) from bilateral and multilateral donors. Corporate income tax makes up around 8% of total domestic revenue. Firms also collect employee income tax (pay-as-you-earn), value added tax, excise duties and fuel duties.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) contribute a small share of overall corporate income tax collection. But they make up over 90% of the private sector. The economy is heavily reliant on these firms for employment and growth.

These businesses struggle to navigate an increasingly complex tax system.

The complexity of Uganda’s tax system makes for a time-consuming tax filing process, compounded by low taxpayer knowledge and high levels of distrust in the Uganda Revenue Authority. The time, money and effort incurred by taxpayers to meet their tax obligations adds to their total tax burden.

These compliance costs also have real economic consequences. Firms might miss out on tax benefits or artificially constrain business growth to avoid greater reporting requirements. Since smaller firms are more constrained in their ability to document revenues, accurately calculate tax liabilities and file returns, they might even pay more tax than necessary.

At the margin, compliance costs affect the economic choices people make: the fear of high compliance costs might induce a potential entrepreneur to take a salaried job instead of starting a new business.

Relieving this burden could unlock greater productivity and growth, and encourage innovation and investment.

For my PhD in economics I collaborated with the Uganda Revenue Authority to generate detailed measures of tax compliance costs, using data from a survey of nearly 2,000 taxpaying SMEs. My research finds that the burden of compliance is significant, even for firms with very little tax revenue to contribute.

Solutions should focus on making compliance easier and ensuring that tax thresholds are set appropriately to exclude unproductive small firms.

The burden

The median firm faces total annual compliance costs of about US$800, equivalent to just under 2% of turnover. These costs are also highly regressive: smaller firms face costs exceeding 20% of turnover, versus less than 1% for the largest firms.

A more troubling result is that many firms, and particularly smaller ones, spend more on completing their tax returns than they pay in actual income tax.

Much of this burden stems from labour time. Employees and firm owners dedicate over 30 hours a month on compliance-related activities, primarily compiling tax documentation and preparing returns. For firm owners personally involved in tax compliance, this responsibility consumes around 20% of their working hours, on average.

Somewhat surprisingly, the amount of time spent on tax compliance does not increase significantly with firm size.

To compensate for limited tax knowledge, many firms use the services of a tax agent. These include external accountants, consultants, or other tax specialists who assist with tax compliance. My research finds that the use of agents is common across all taxpayer categories and is primarily driven by a desire to ensure proper compliance, rather than to minimise tax liabilities.

Although these agents do not necessarily reduce compliance costs, since firms spend an average of US$54 per month on agents’ fees, related research shows that they have a broadly positive impact on the quality of tax returns submitted.

What can be done

The Ugandan parliament recently voted on the 2025 tax amendment bills, with measures aiming to bolster revenue collection and simplify compliance. For instance, policymakers propose to use the national identity document as a taxpayer identification number, rather than requiring separate tax registration.

But policymakers should consider bolder actions.

Firstly, the administrative thresholds for corporate income tax and presumptive tax (a simplified tax on business income for the smallest firms) have not been adjusted for over a decade. In a high inflation environment, this means that the tax system is capturing many firms with very little profit, and no tax to pay. Yet, these firms still bear compliance costs, and the revenue service incurs administrative costs registering and monitoring unproductive taxpayers.

Roughly 30% to 35% of firms filing returns each year file a nil return, meaning that they report zero on all significant fields of the tax return. Even these firms report compliance costs of, on average, around US$500 per year.

Rather than chasing the “little guy”, bigger revenue gains are likely to come from focusing on the largest businesses. For instance, research shows that tax incentives and exemptions cost Uganda over US$40 million in lost revenue per year.

Secondly, the Ugandan corporate income tax return is particularly long, complex, and more suited to the business structure of very large firms, rather than the SMEs making up most of the Ugandan economy. In addition to changing the thresholds, simplifying the return would be beneficial.

Filing processes could also be eased through automated pre-filling, for instance by using information from a firm’s monthly VAT returns to pre-populate parts of the corporate income tax return. The rollout of the Uganda Revenue Authority’s electronic invoicing system for VAT is a promising step in this direction, although it has been met with resistance by taxpayers.

Adrienne Lees receives funding from the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD). Through the ICTD, the research described in this article has been supported by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation and the Gates Foundation.

– ref. Uganda’s tax system is a drain on small businesses: how to set them free – https://theconversation.com/ugandas-tax-system-is-a-drain-on-small-businesses-how-to-set-them-free-258120

July 5, 2025

Ghana and Zambia have snubbed Africa’s leading development bank: why they should change course

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Misheck Mutize, Post Doctoral Researcher, Graduate School of Business (GSB), University of Cape Town

The governments of Ghana and Zambia recently took a decision that could have serious consequences for other African countries. The decision relates to arrangements on how the two countries will repay the debt they owe to Africa Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank).

They have both taken decisions to relegate Afreximbank to a commercial lender from a preferred creditor. This means that the terms on which Afreximbank has lent money to these two countries will change. And it will lose certain protections. For example preferred creditors are repaid first, before any other lenders.

This protects preferred creditors’ balance sheets and enables them to continue lending during crisis periods when others cannot. In contrast, commercial banks get paid later or might not get paid at all. This higher risk factor means that they charge higher rates.

Based on decades of researching Africa’s capital markets and the institutions that govern them it’s my view that the long-term consequences of this precedent are detrimental. If other African borrowers follow suit, treating loans from African multilateral development banks as ordinary commercial debt during restructuring, it will erode the viability of these institutions. Investors who fund Afreximbank through bonds and capital markets may reassess its risk profile, pushing up its cost of funding and making future lending less affordable.

The ultimate losers will be African countries themselves, especially those with limited access to international capital. Afreximbank, along with other African financial institutions, is a lifeline for trade finance, infrastructure development, and crisis response. Undermining its legal protections weakens the continent’s capacity for self-reliant development.

Afreximbank was created under the auspices of the African Development Bank (AfDB) in 1993. It was set up with a public interest mandate to develop African trade and promote integration. Its legal status and structural features place it closer to international multilateral development banks than to private creditors, justifying its treatment as a preferred creditor.

The decision by Accra and Lusaka signals lack of confidence in African financial institutions. It suggests that they do not trust them to the same extent as global institutions like the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. These are treated as preferred creditors, on the assumption that they will lend to countries in crisis or distress when commercial lenders retreat.

The actions of Ghana and Zambia set a dangerous precedent by sidelining African financial institutions in favour of external creditors. That risks weakening Africa’s financial institutions and undermining the very concept of African solutions to African problems. Investors will become more sceptical and pessimistic, demanding more interest.

The continent needs to develop an ability to independently design, finance and implement its economic development policies without support from external financial institutions. Afreximbank helps to achieve this through financing African-designed infrastructure and counter-cyclical lending.

Ghana and Zambia still have an opportunity to correct course. In my view they should do so for the sake of the bank, its member states and the future of African economic sovereignty.

The background

Ghana and Zambia have both defaulted on their external bonds in the last four years. Zambia in October 2020 and Ghana in December 2022. This forced them to negotiate new sustainable terms with creditors.

During their respective debt negotiations, both countries have announced that they would include African multilateral development banks such as Afreximbank and the Trade and Development Bank in the debt restructuring.

This followed private and bilateral creditors contesting unequal distribution of restructuring burdens, where they face losses while some multilateral institutions are shielded. The International Monetary Fund and World Bank, which are preferred creditors, do not fund infrastructure, they only offer balance of payments support.

The decision by Ghana and Zambia to relegate Afreximbank was made during an ongoing comprehensive debt restructuring. Ghana and Zambia have been negotiating with creditors for over a year in an attempt to resolve their sovereign debt crises.

The two countries were complying with International Monetary Fund supported restructuring terms. Bilateral creditors were also demanding fair burden sharing with African multilateral banks.

Afreximbank: not just another lender

Ghana and Zambia don’t have a legal leg to stand on.

Afreximbank’s preferred creditor status is not an informal privilege but derives from Article VX(1) of its founding agreement. The agreement has been signed and ratified by member states into national laws, including Ghana and Zambia.

This status is further reinforced by the bank’s diplomatic immunities and privileges and its ability to operate across African jurisdictions under protected legal frameworks. The role of Afreximbank, therefore, goes beyond that of a traditional commercial bank.

Preferred creditor status protects development finance institutions in a number of ways. The biggest protection is that lenders are prioritised for repayment. This protects their balance sheets, enabling them to continue lending when others cannot.

A preferred creditor status is accorded for a reason. It is to ensure that development finance institutions can lend in times of distress with confidence, on the guarantee that they will be repaid ahead of other creditors. Country actions that violate this principle disrupt the implicit covenant that enables counter-cyclical financing. This is breaking the financial lifeline that countries might need when nobody else is willing to help them. This is precisely the kind of support that Ghana and Zambia relied on during their respective debt crises in December 2022 and October 2020, respectively.

A bank that has consistently stepped up

It is worth recalling that during the COVID-19 pandemic (2019–2021) and again when global markets closed access to Eurobond issuances for African countries, investors didn’t want to lend African countries for fear of defaulting. Afreximbank was one of the few institutions that continued to lend to African sovereigns. This included US$750 million to Ghana and US$45 million to Zambia.

When Ghana, Zambia and other commodity export-dependent countries faced acute foreign currency shortages and tightening global liquidity caused by the 2015/16 commodity crisis of low prices, Afreximbank did not hesitate to deploy resources.

Zambia has also benefited significantly from Afreximbank’s trade and development finance in energy, agriculture and healthcare. These are areas that many commercial banks view as too risky or low-margin.

For Zambia and Ghana to classify Afreximbank in the same category as hedge funds, bondholders or purely commercial lenders, is ahistorical and unwarranted.

Restructuring loans from Afreximbank risks inadvertently raising the cost of capital for African countries. If Afreximbank can no longer be shielded under preferred creditor status norms, it may be forced to adopt more conservative lending practices, charge higher risk premiums or retreat from high-risk markets altogether.

The knock-on effect is reduced access to affordable, timely financing for countries that need it most.

Afreximbank has rejected the idea that its loans ought to be restructured.

Ghana and Zambia should correct course

Ghana and Zambia still have an opportunity to correct course. They can reaffirm Afreximbank’s preferred creditor status, exclude it from restructuring tables meant for commercial creditors, and honour their legal commitments.

In doing so, they would not only preserve their reputations as reliable debtors but also strengthen the broader fabric of African financial solidarity.

African countries must be cognisant that no one else will build their institutions for them. If they do not defend and respect them, they cannot expect the rest of the world to do so. The credibility, sustainability and legitimacy of Africa’s financial independence depends, in large part, on how they treat the institutions they have built.

The decision to treat Afreximbank and the Trade and Development Bank like commercial lenders is short-sighted and self-defeating. It must be reversed.

Misheck Mutize does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Ghana and Zambia have snubbed Africa’s leading development bank: why they should change course – https://theconversation.com/ghana-and-zambia-have-snubbed-africas-leading-development-bank-why-they-should-change-course-258467