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The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of access to credit on technical efficiency (TE) of maize farmers in a developing country, Ghana.

The study employed an instrumental variable approach and the stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) method for the estimation of the results.

The study found that farmers who have access to agricultural credit stand the chance of increasing TE by a margin of 8%, which also influences the maize production than those who did not have access to credit. The average TE score of the farmers was 74%. The study also found out that factors like membership, gender, farmers' access to credit, age and social network determine farmers' possibility of accessing agricultural credit. The study finds out that returns to size are increasing among the maize farmers and that significant improvement in efficiency can be realized by increasing the level of input used in production. Also, factors such as farm size, labor, seeds and fertilizer are the essential determinants of maize production output. Also, gender, extension, age, off-farm income, access to credit and membership were significant factors influencing technical inefficiency (TI).

The paper contributes to the existing literature on agricultural credit on rural agricultural development. The problem of endogeneity associated with access to credit, which has been considered by other researchers, is dealt with this study. This paper also provides information to government policymakers, practitioners and all other stakeholders in the maize sub-sectors and also will benefit small farmers outside the study area.

The purpose of this research is to examine the validity of the agriculture-induced environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis with evidence from an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach with a structural break including real income and energy consumption in the model for Ghana over the period 1980–2014.

The ARDL approach with a structural break was used to analyze the agriculture-induced EKC model which has not been studied in Ghana. The dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS), canonical cointegration regression (CCR) and fully modified ordinary least squares (FMOLS) econometric methods were further used to validate the robustness of the estimates, and the direction of the relationship between the study variables was also clarified using the Toda–Yamamoto Granger causality test.

The ARDL results revealed that GDP, energy consumption and agricultural value added have significant positive effects on CO₂ emissions, while GDP² reduces CO₂ emissions. The Toda-Yamamoto causality test results show a bidirectional causality running from GDP and energy consumption to CO₂ emissions whereas a unidirectional long-term causality runs from GDP² and agriculture value-added to CO₂ emissions.

This finding validated the presence of the agriculture-induced EKC hypothesis in Ghana in both the short run and long run, and the important role of agriculture and energy consumption in economic growth was confirmed by the respective bidirectional and unidirectional causal relationships between the two variables and GDP. Thus, a reduction in unsustainable agricultural practices is recommended through specific policies to strengthen institutional quality in Ghana for a paradigm shift from rudimentary technology to modern sustainable agrarian technologies.

This study is novel in the EKC literature in Ghana, as no study has yet been done on agriculture-induced EKC in Ghana, and the other EKC studies also failed to account for structural breaks which have been done by this study. This study further includes a causality analysis to examine the direction of the relationship which the few EKC studies in Ghana failed to address. Finally, dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS), canonical cointegration regression (CCR) and fully modified ordinary least squares (FMOLS) methods are used for robustness check, unlike other studies with single methodologies.

This paper aims to examine the determinants of rural dwellers financial literacy in Ghana.

A cross-sectional primary data set was used to estimate the factors influencing rural farm households' financial literacy using the IV-Tobit model.

The findings reveal that most rural residents are financially illiterate. The econometrics model results depicted that respondents' socioeconomic and demographic characteristics such as gender, income, age and education significantly affect financial literacy. Again, respondents who are risk seekers and listen or watch education programs are more likely to be financially literate.

The paper examined the determinants of rural dwellers financial literacy in four regions in Ghana. Future research should consider all or many regions for an informed generalization of findings.

This paper provides evidence that rural dwellers are financially illiterate and it would require the policymakers or non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to establish a village or community group that comprises a wide range of bankers and government officials to help rural dwellers acquire some financial skills. Also, the positive relationship between media (whether respondent watches or listens to educational programs) and financial literacy implies that policymakers should focus on improving individuals' financial knowledge through training programs and utilize the media as a channel to propagate financial education to the public.

Although previous studies have examined the determinants of financial literacy, little is known in developing countries and, in particular, rural communities. The authors fill this gap by contributing to the scanty existing literature in developing countries in several ways. First, this is the first study to examine the financial literacy level of rural dwellers in Ghana. Second, to not undermine the credibility of the estimation results, this study addresses the potential endogeneity issue, which other researchers have not adequately recognized. Finally, the study expands the scant literature on the subject and provides critical policy implications that will help policymakers formulate financial market policies that will contribute to rural dwellers financial literacy enhancement.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of savings mobilization on access to credit among smallholder farmers’ in the Birim central municipality of Ghana.

A cross-sectional primary data set was used to estimate the factors influencing smallholder farmers’ access to credit and size of loan to be borrowed using the IV-Probit and IV-Tobit model.

The results of the study revealed that savings mobilization has a positive significant impact on access to credit and the total amount of credit one can borrow as well. Other control variables such as transaction cost and farm size depicted a negative significant impact on access to credit. Land ownership, member of an association, household size, years of farming experience and education also showed a positive significant impact on access to credit.

The paper only examined the savings effect on credit accessibility among smallholder farmers in one of the municipality’s in the Eastern region of Ghana. Future research should consider all or many municipality for an informed generalization of findings.

This paper provides evidence that smallholder farmers knowledge on the financial market is poor and it would require the policymakers or NGOs to organize financial management training programs so that the farmers high ignorance of the financial market will significantly reduce.

Although existing studies have examined smallholder farmers’ access to credit, the unique contribution of this paper is the analysis of the impact of saving mobilization on credit accessibility in Ghana, a major access to credit determinant in the financial market. In addition, those researchers who factored in savings as an access to credit determinant did not also consider the casual relationship between these two variables, thus, the present of endogeneity of which this paper does.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the factors influencing rural youth farmers’ credit constraints status and the effect of credit constraint on the intensity of participation of these farmers in Ghana.

The econometric estimation is based on cross-sectional data collected in 2018 from the Brong Ahafo region in Ghana. The sample data set consists of 450 rural youth farmers. The collected data were analyzed through different econometric techniques, using the endogenous switching regression model (ERSM).

The direct elicitation approach employed in this study revealed that out of the 450 farmers, 211 (47 percent) of the respondents were credit constrained compared to 239 (53 percent) of their counterparts who were unconstrained. The ERSM indicated that youth farmers education, age, savings, parents occupation reduced the probability of the rural youth farmer to be credit constrained but cumbersome loan application procedure and loan disbursement time positively affect credit constraint. Moreover, farmers that are credit constrained have lower intensity of participation in agriculture activities than a random farmer from the sample. This suggests that access to credit has a positive impact on the intensity of participation in agriculture activities.

In this study, only rural youth farmers in a particular region were considered. However, there are youths all over the nation. Therefore, future researchers could consider other youth’s farmers elsewhere in the country.

Although existing studies have examined rural youth farmers’ participation in agriculture and credit constraint separately, the unique contribution of this paper is the analysis of credit constraint of rural youth farmers as well as the impact of credit constraint on the intensity of participation in agriculture activities.

In Covid-19 pandemic era when most households' members have lost their jobs and incomes, the government assistance and programs in ensuring household consumption smoothing is very significant. The main objectives of this study are to analyze the impact of government expenditure and free maternal healthcare (FMHC) policy on household consumption expenditure in Ghana in both long run and short run.

They used the ARDL to estimate the impact of government expenditure on household consumption and Segmented Linear Regression to examine impact of FMHC policy household consumption using longitudinal data from 1967 to 2018.

The results revealed that government expenditure had a negative and statistically significant effect on household consumption expenditure suggesting that government expenditure crowed-out private consumption in Ghana. Also, it was observed that before the implementation of the FMHC policy, there was an increase household consumption expenditure, but after the introduction of the FMHC policy, the study household consumption expenditure decreases significantly suggesting that FMHC policy has strong association with household consumption in Ghana.

Due to limited data availability, this study did not assess the impact of the FMHC policy at the household or district level. Also, Ghana has introduced a free senior high school education policy in 2017 so further research could analyze the implications of these policies for household consumption in Ghana at the micro-level using different estimation technique such as the difference in difference.

The study suggests the need to increase public spending on basic social amenities and also extend the free maternal healthcare policy to all pregnant women especially those in the rural areas of Ghana as these have a greater impact on household consumption in Ghana. The findings from this study have important implications for household savings and interest rate in Ghana. The findings from this study also have important implications for both fiscal policy and healthcare policy in Ghana and other developing countries.

To the best of my knowledge this is the first empirical study to examine the effect of government expenditure and free maternal healthcare policy on household consumption in Ghana.

In the developing countries, formal credit has dominant role for the development of agriculture sector. It increases the farmer's purchasing power for better farm inputs and agricultural technology for high crop productivity. The main purpose of this study is to examine the influence of socioeconomic characteristics of smallholder farmers for credit demand in Sindh, Pakistan.

A cross-sectional data set randomly collected from 90 smallholder farmers in Thatta district, Sindh, Pakistan, is examined. Descriptive statistics, correlation and the OLS regression method were used to demonstrate the important factors affecting the demand for formal credit.

The results revealed that formal education, experience of farming, landholding size, road access and extension contacts positively and significantly influenced the demand for formal credit.

This study is the first, to the best of authors' knowledge, to demonstrate the influence of various socioeconomic characteristics of smallholder farmers on demand for formal credit in Sindh, Pakistan. It also illustrates the imperative contribution to the literature regarding credit access and demand to improve the agricultural productivity.