Essay on Ghana: Education and Georgia State University

Submitted By lolaaab
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Pages: 4
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Ghana One calm autumn day while at the Sweet Auburn Curb Market, I passed a restaurant called "Afrodish," that seems to catch my eye over and over again. Ralph Sarpong, the owner of the appealing eatery, is a native of Ghana – a country located in West Africa. After inquiring, I learned that he was an alumni of Georgia State University with a concentration in finance. Intriguing me, I questioned and wanted to explore the country of Ghana and what it had to offer. Focusing on three general areas: socioeconomic status, government economy, and citizen opinions; focusing on education – I hope to find supporting reasons on why Mr. Sarpong may have left his home country of Ghana. Being able to show the challenges lesser developed countries face, may be able to make other more appreciative of the country we live in today. To give a little background on the country of Ghana, it's a prominent place in African history and culture. A country which is immensely culturally diverse, with a population of roughly 25 million people. Sadly, there's a strong North-South divide within the country. Their literacy rate is one among the lowest, at 23 percent. Younger people within the ages of 10 and 24 years old represent a little over one third of Ghana's population. Infant and maternal mortality rates are continuously increasing along with teenage pregnancies, with girls between ages 10 and 24 responsible for one third of all births in the country. Ghana is bursting at the seams with things like poverty, hunger, poor governance, etc. Corruption has had devastating effects on not only the individual citizens, but also on the country as a whole. To say the least, Ghana is one of the least developed countries in the entire world. More than half of Ghana's labor force is involved in agriculture or fishing as their primary occupation. Both industries increased between the late 1960's and 1990's, but is now in a period of decline; due to over-harvesting. Small businesses form the bulk of the service industry, providing repairs for almost anything one could possibly think of. While there have been modest gains and relatively decent economic growth, the severest impact has been on the huge majority of Ghanaians with declining wages, higher prices and expensive goods, fewer jobs, less government involvement, and deteriorating health care systems. Ghana has a democratic republic type of government which was influenced by a parliamentary system based on that of the British. President John Dramani Mahama was elected in July 2012 to take this country under his wing. Even so, since the early sixty's – the gap between governmental policies and their results has continued to widen. The real problems began earlier in Ghanaian history with the first prime minister and president, Kwame Nkrumah, being what we call "impeached". After that, the next 14 years saw a continued deterioration of the economy and consequent political upheavals. But, since 1981 – the political scene has been somewhat stable, yet the economy still tends to show signs of weakness and dependency. One economic topic that seems to resurface time and time again is the resource-rich land that Ghana is built upon. Unfortunately, it's facing what many economists call the, "Natural Resource Curse." This problem alone strongly affects the economic growth Ghana could one day obtain. The myth is that most countries with hefty sums of natural resources, including oil and gas, seem to be lacking in the areas of development and governance. With everything from mineral deposits, natural gases, timber, rubber, and gold; Ghana has proven the stereotype. The lack of development in Ghana can be seen when referring back to the statistics of the country. For example: life expectancy, poverty rates, HIV and literacy rates, teenage pregnancies
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