This thesis has explored the implementation of the primary health care strategy in Ghana, focusing on the Maternal Child Health program, one of main components of the strategy and the program that seems to have been most widely implemented in the country. / The analysis has been concerned primarily with identifying the obstacles to the implementation of this strategy in rural areas of the country, where levels of utilization and participation have been found to be lower than what was hoped for by the government. It does this by using data collected through in-depth interviews and participant observation in three rural villages of the country. / The findings reveal that a complex range of interrelated factors influence or deter women from utilizing and participating in the MCH program.

No description available.

This thesis explores the landscape of popular music culture in Accra as it is experienced by a loosely interactive group of young self-identified rastafarians. The global pop-culture idiom born of the Jamaican socio-religious movement of rastafari allows these young Accrans to articulate self-concepts vis-a-vis very current trends in local and foreign youth cultures (such as hiphop), with reference to an ostensibly ageless collective identity. Questions of authenticity are made complex by the movement's weighty historical and political roots, its nuanced symbolic bonds with "local African culture", and the semiotic plasticity of its identifying practices. Ethnographic portions of this thesis are based on three months of fieldwork in Accra, during the summer of 2004. Key theoretical points are gleaned from a critical examination of early British Cultural Studies and its theoretical progeny, including the body of recent work tentatively dubbed "post-subcultural studies".

Thesis (doctoral) - Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, 2007. / Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. [279]-284)

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1974. / Typescript. Vita. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio University, March, 2007. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Adopting a mixed methods approach consisting of interviews, focus group discussions and surveys, this thesis investigates the state of digital publishing in Ghana within the context of Rogers’ diffusion of innovation theory. With a focus on children’s ebooks, it examines publishers’, authors’ and readers’ levels of adoption of ebooks, and their motivations for, perceptions of, and challenges or barriers to, going digital or otherwise. It also assesses the state of digital infrastructure and human resource capacity in Ghana to support the growing ebook sector, and identifies the knowledge and skills deficit in the industry in order to inform the development of courses that will be incorporated into the BA Publishing Studies programme at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). This thesis reveals that the level of adoption of ebook publishing among publishers and authors was relatively low given the interest demonstrated by young readers. The latter were very interested in ebooks and read mainly foreign content because it was freely available and accessible online. Publishers’ and authors’ motivations for publishing ebooks include visibility, the opportunity to reach a much wider audience, and the novelty of publishing digitally to keep abreast of current trends so as to transform the local industry. Some barriers to adoption identified were the cost associated with acquiring infrastructure, the security of online content, inadequate information about ebooks, non-use of ebooks, and infrastructural challenges such as inconsistent electricity supply and poor Internet penetration. The thesis also identified an awareness disconnect between publishers and their local readers: publishers perceive ebooks to be for the international market and, as such, do not focus on promoting them in the local market; thus, local readers are not aware of the existence of ebooks. Expanding on Rogers’ adoption categories, two new categories were created, incidental adopters and perceptual late adopters, to accommodate individuals who do not fall within Rogers’ established adopter categories. To increase the spread of digital publishing and the uptake of ebooks in the Ghanaian book market, the thesis recommends the elimination of the barriers to adoption and, most importantly, advocates training and skills development to reduce the knowledge and skills deficit gap among publishers and authors.

Growth in information and communication technology (ICT) is drastically changing the way businesses, especially in the service industries, are conducted. The financial services industry and banking in particular, is not excluded from this technology explosion. Internet banking, even though not new in advanced countries, is a new transaction channel being used by banks in some parts of Africa, especially Ghana, to offer various products and services to their customers. However, this medium has not been fully exploited by these banks as there are many hurdles the banks must triumph over. In deploying this technology and these systems, there are several factors which banks must take into consideration before fully deploying such a system to their customers, hence the motivation for this study. The absence of suitable and sufficient knowledge on this topic also exposes a “rhetoric versus reality” argument of whether the intention to adopt Internet banking is critical to the strategies and ultimate success of banks in Ghana. For banks to stay ahead of competition as well as to attract and maintain their clientele, it is of paramount importance to gather and link the perspectives of both clients and bank managers in order for banks to ensure that they perform according to the needs and expectations of their clients. In order to achieve the intended results, an empirical study was conducted by taking into consideration the viewpoints of both bank clients and bank managers in determining the factors that customers take into consideration before adopting the Internet banking medium. The primary aim of this study was to quantify significant relationships between the selected variables. Therefore the positivism research paradigm was used, while the phenomenological paradigm was employed for the measuring instruments. Because multiple sources of data were used, from the perspectives of banking clients and managers in Ghana, methodological triangulation was adopted for this study. The results of the empirical investigation showed that both groups (clients and managers) considered the variables of market share, technology acceptance, diffusion of innovation, organisational variables, organisational efficiency, and business strategy to have direct influence on the adoption of Internet banking. However, they differed in opinion concerning the degree of influence of these variables. The bank managers’ responses leaned more towards strong agreement with the importance of these variables than did those of the bank clients. Thus, for bank clients to readily adopt the Internet banking medium for their banking transactions, bank managers must take a closer look at these determinant factors described in the study. The study showed that the population group, educational and income levels exerted an influence on the perceptions clients have regarding Internet banking adoption factors. It was found that the higher the education and income levels of the clients, the easier it was for them to adopt Internet banking. Also, the male group dominated the use of the Internet banking. This is supported by the fact that there is a growing middle class in Ghana that falls within this category of banking clients.

Population Resettlement forms the general subject area of this study. This topic is described in general terms to establish the fact that population resettlement is a problem common to many developing countries. Since the importance which a nation attaches to population resettlement depends on national circumstances, the significance of the problem of population resettlement in Ghana is reviewed as a case study. Ghana is a developing country which is currently implementing a multi-purpose river basin development scheme, called the Volta River Project. Basically, it is a hydroelectric power project. The Volta Lake has displaced some 80,000 riparian settlers in the Volta Basin. The displaced people should be resettled in new settlements, and they should be provided with satisfactory housing, employment, and social facilities and amenities. All these aspects of population resettlement call for the formulation of major governmental policies. It is hypothesized that the Volta Basin Population Resettlement Scheme must contribute towards the attainment of Ghana's social, economic, and physical planning objectives. The method of investigation is based on the premise that population resettlement is not an isolated problem, and that it should be examined within a national framework. Consequently, the highlights of the national objectives and policies of Ghana, as defined in the Ghana Seven-Year Development Plan, 1963/64 to 1969/70, are stated. To put the population resettlement scheme in perspective, the Volta River Project is analyzed to show its national importance and its compatibility with the national objectives of Ghana. Multi-purpose river basin development projects, carried out in India and the United States of America, involved the relocation of families in potential reservoir areas. A review of the Damodar Valley Project in India and the Tennessee Valley Project in the United States of America indicate that population resettlement is a national problem, the solution of which requires the formulation of policies by the highest level of government in a country. On the basis of experience in India and the United States of America, the following criteria for evaluating Ghana's population resettlement scheme are evolved: (1) Declared National Objectives; (2) Regional Development Project as part of a National Plan; (3) Education for Population Resettlement; (4) Planned Settlements; (5) Consistency of Project Administration with National Policies; and (6) Devolution of Functions. The criteria are applied to the Volta Basin Population Resettlement Scheme. The findings of this application tend to substantiate the hypothesis, that the Volta Basin Population Resettlement Scheme must contribute towards the attainment of Ghana's social, economic, and physical planning objectives. Nevertheless, the method of investigation is evaluated. Its shortcomings stem from the lack of sufficient data for detailed regional analysis of the population resettlement scheme. Other ways of implementing a population resettlement scheme are evaluated. It is concluded from this evaluation that Ghana's approach to population resettlement will most probably contribute to the attainment of her national objectives. It is, however, recommended that education for population resettlement should be a continuing process. It is further recommended that the Volta River Development Act should be amended to enable the Volta River Authority to transfer some of its functions to the Urban and Local Councils in the Volta Basin Planning Region. In the final analysis, it is the people in the new settlements who will ensure the success of the population resettlement scheme. It is therefore recommended that there should be permanent machinery for carrying out continuing evaluations of the people's reactions to changes to be brought about by the Volta River Project. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

Provision of adequate housing in the urban areas of Ghana constitutes a major problem. In the Accra-Tema-Akosorabo Region of Ghana, the housing shortage is becoming more acute as a result of continuing population growth, which is due to natural increase; and to massive drift of population to the region because of the implementation of the Volta River project, and the industrialization of the region. It is the policy of the Ghana Government to provide houses to meet the needs of the inhabitants of the Acera-Tema-Akosorabo Region. The problem here is the determination of appropriate locations for the housing projects scheduled for the region, to aid in solving the housing problem, and to promote the balanced social and economic development of the region. Location of housing projects is critical in solving the housing shortage because location of housing projects influences: the size of project; the cost and quality of utility services; the cost of community services generally; and the cost of transportation. The location factors must be considered in the light of all other factors, such as place of work, with which housing location is interrelated. The search for a rational approach to the selection of location for housing projects leads to the study hypothesis: That the planned location of government-sponsored housing projects, as a solution to the housing problem in the Accra-Tema-Akosombo Region of Ghana, should be based on a comprehensive regional planning approach. The investigation of the comprehensive regional planning approach to the location of housing projects in the Accra-Tema-Akosombo Region is based on the assumptions that: the Ghana Government will continue to sponsor the provision of housing for all the inhabitants of the region; there will be no drastic changes or complete abandonment of the region's development programme; and that the housing needs of the urban dwellers are not to be considered as more urgent than those of the rural dwellers in the region. The study reveals that all the assumptions are valid. The Ghana Government's national policy of industrialization and urbanization as stated in the Seven-Year Development Plan (I963-I97O) is reviewed together with the regional development programme and plan for the Accra-Tema-Akosombo Region. These reviews shed light on both the national and the regional socio-economic development policies and programmes, of which housing is a part. Since very little has been written about the comprehensive regional planning approach to the location of housing projects, the concept underlying location of housing projects in the Durgapur Region of India is reviewed in order to throw light on the value of this concept. The conclusions drawn from the case study indicate that the process of selection of locations for housing projects is based on a comprehensive regional planning approach. The "Durgapur approach" provides the basis for relating the comprehensive regional planning approach to the location of housing projects in the Accra-Tema-Akosombo Region of Ghana. Criteria based on this approach are formulated for location of housing projects in the A.T.A. Region. A review of the three levels of planning, namely local, regional, and national, reveal that the comprehensive regional planning approach to the location of housing projects, in the Accra-Tema-Akosombo Region, is the most suitable approach. Despite the stated limitations, it is concluded that the regional approach would contribute to the rational selection of locations for housing projects in the regions of developing countries. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate