General

The success of any country is dependent on the collective behaviour of the nation. Generally, the people’s work commitment, attitude, and hard work help determine their financial profile. However, it’s difficult to determine what should be the direction of efforts. Here we present a secret recipe for leading Africa to an unmatchable success. This secret is, that African cities must be, Regionally Productive, Connected worldwide, and Self-reliant. The development of any country is dependent on the production capacity and optimization of economic activities. This capacity needs to be aligned with modern infrastructure and be self-reliant in terms of resource utilization and foods production. This model can be applied for Africa to develop. However, this approach is only effective when we collectively put in our efforts and ensure each step of the process is taken with due consideration. For Africa to develop, we need to rework our cities to enhance productivity in different aspects of human life.  Let’s understand how this productivity can be achieved and what practices need to be followed. We need to make Africa productive: productive in terms of economic stability; productive in terms of resource utilization; productive in terms of increasing exports and the GDP of the country.  Regionally productive refers to optimizing processes leading to higher output against limited input. It’s about creating an ecosystem that encourages skills, competence, integrity, and technological advancements in the country.  In simple words, we need to review how things are made in our country, the problems with the supply chain, the frictional forces leading to production losses, and how things can be controlled to ensure economic reforms. Further, productivity can be divided into two main parts: economic productivity and labour productivity.  Economic productivity is based on getting maximum output with limited input. It can be done via process optimization and efficient resource utilization. Process optimization means introducing some innovation/changes in the overall production process to ensure all controllable aspects are monitored and managed.  So, it aims to achieve production by incurring the least cost and not compromising the quality aspects of the product. This process aims to produce products at a low price, making them attractive to the international market. Hence, it’s expected to increase exports and durable economic stability. It’s equally important to note that durable economic stability cannot be achieved without exporting outside of the country. The second component of productivity is labour initiatives. This refers to the efficiency of the labour to work and achieve optimal production levels. If labour is productive, more goods will be produced in a limited time. This can be achieved by implementing training, production reforms, technological advancements, and achievement of the learning curve to ensure long-term financial sustainability. A learning curve is when labour gets proficiency in the performance of the task. It helps ensure that the business gets desired productions in a limited time. Considering the demographics and energetic people of Africa, taking timely steps to train (re-skilling and up-skilling) our people can be an excellent step towards achieving a learning curve.  Further, a greater advantage of this efficient and effective labour management, is higher wages (leading to financial prosperity); lower product price(efficient production can lead to lower product costing); higher business profit (skilled labour is expected to improve product quality and enhance the business); and overall stronger economic growth.   Another perspective of being productive is the integration of the different industrial processes. For instance, for a successful export, the business needs to source materials, labour, processes, transportation, energy/fuel, competent staff, and comply with regulations and other aspects of running and effectively operating the business.  Process optimization is about managing operations so that the process is completed quickly with the least resource wastage. Likewise, there is a need to develop a strong mechanism for a transportation system, energy consumption, and regulatory reforms. Regulatory reform is an area where African Governments have a massive role to play. Although, Ghana has a good rating in terms of starting a business and getting electricity which is 85 and 77 respectively, (statistica)however, there is a massive need to improve trading across borders and enforcing of contracts. Trading across borders refers to procedural formalities for imports and exports. This metric is divided into three sub-categories: domestic transport, border compliance, and documentary compliance. The Government of Ghana needs to thoroughly work on these aspects to ensure ease of doing business.  Enforcing a contract refers to the cost and time required for resolving commercial disputes. There is a need to work on the quality of judicial processes and make the overall process effective and efficient.  So, taking steps in terms of business process optimization, economic stability, constructive infrastructure, improving judicial reforms, and import/export formalities is expected to bring productivity to the overall business environment of Africa.  A good idea can be to start by developing some model city where all such facilities are provided to the business. From time to time, such initiatives can be spread across the country. So, to make Africa productive, we need to enhance the productivity of our cities.  Ideally, the test city would need to have several coherent similarities with many other African cities to allow for the most learning and interactions that can more easily be replicated across the continent.   Worldwide connectivity is the basis of the country’s international trade and export performance. If routes and connections of the country with an international market are strong, it leads to higher exports and higher GDP. There are two aspects of looking at worldwide connectivity. The first is the logistics perspective, and the second is international affiliation and trading associations. The logistics perspective refers to how businesses can streamline overall supply chain management. It includes order handling, managing production, inventory management, packaging, storing, and efficiently dealing with the process of exports clearance.   For export clearance, there is a need to maintain a standard of procedural compliance as a protocol for the shipping companies and compliance with an international trade norm.  From a logistics perspective, 38 out of 54 states in Africa have a coastal region with

Football is one of the most beloved sports throughout the world. This game carries fans more than any other game worldwide. There are an estimated 3.5 billion soccer fans around the globe, making soccer the top sport globally. Cricket, hockey and Tennis stand second, third, and fourth respectively.  The beauty of this game is that it leads to organic nourishment of the mental and physical capacity of the player. Mental capacity is enhanced by coordination among players, setting strategies to defend or attack and building team spirit. On the other hand, physical capacity is enhanced as this game involves extensive, continuous running. Let’s discuss different aspects of this game including its general history and from the perspective of Ghana.  History of football in the World The history of football can be traced back to 2,000 years. Different countries in the world claim the origin of this game. These countries include Greece, China, Rome, Japan, and Great Britain. Greece used to play the game called Episkyros. This game involved throwing a ball over the heads of team members. It also involved coordination among players using a ball. Hence, Greece claimed football originated in their country. Likewise, the Military in Ancient China used to play Tsu Chu’s sport. This game was designed to kick a leather ball in the net with feet. And players were not allowed to touch the ball with their hands. So, it was in some manner similar to modern-day football. That is why the Chinese claim football originates from their country. In the Roman Empire, the game played was called harpastum. This game involved opposing an opponent and bringing the ball to one’s own side of the court. So, Romanians claim football was started in their country.   Similarly, the Japanese used to play a game called Kemari. In this sport, the players used to work as a team and keep the ball in the air. So, this game also involved team coordination with a single ball on the ground. Hence, the Japanese claim that football originates in Japan. History suggests that Great Britain had originated the game’s rules regarding touching the ball with hands, tripping opponents and uniforms in this sport. With time, more complexity was introduced into the game. For instance, a penalty kick was introduced to compensate the victim team. Similarly, the system of yellow and red cards was introduced. This led to more and more discipline on the ground and increasing interest of the people in this game. (stadium) Football’s International Federation Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) is an international football association founded on May 21, 1904, in France. This association is designed with the responsibility to promote this sport globally. FIFA is also responsible for managing and maintaining tournaments throughout the world. Further, FIFA works to advocate sports integrity and fair play globally. The members of this association include 211 national associations and six confederations. These members belong to different countries of the world. Federations operate throughout different continents. FIFA governs matters related to regulations of the games, organization of the international competitions and tournaments including the FIFA world cup, encouraging coaching methodologies, establishing enhanced standards for the game, working on sports medicine, and the overall development of football around the globe.   The efforts of FIFA can be seen by analysing the fact that this association conducts different tournaments and competitions including the Under-20 World Cup, the Women’s World Cup, the Under-17 World Cup, the Futsal World Cup, and the Beach Soccer World Cup. However, the FIFA World Cup remains the top tournament of all of them. History of the World Cup tournament  The FIFA World Cup tournament is one of the most prestigious sports tournaments globally. The World Cup is conducted every four years and 32 teams take part in the world cup. Further, the host country for the World Cup is selected by FIFA. The first official FIFA World Cup was conducted in 1930. This match was played between Argentina and Uruguay; Uruguay won the match. After that, the World Cup was conducted after every four years. The Second World War interrupted the consistency of the game. However, it was resumed in 1950 and played after every four years. The next FIFA World Cup is to be played from November 21, 2022, to December 18, 2022. In FIFA World Cup history, 79 nations have competed in the tournament, and twenty-one final tournaments have been played. Only eight national teams have been champions that have won the Cup. Brazil stands first in the queue with five times wins. Other winning nations include Germany and Italy (each won four times). In addition to this, France, Argentina, and Uruguay have been a winner (each won two times). Similarly, Spain and England have won the title once. (wiki) History of the World Cup in Ghana  Ghana made her debut in 2006 and she has played in three World Cups tournaments; in 2006, 2010, and 2014. She missed out in 2018. Ghana has now also qualified for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. Ghana’s national team is called the Black Stars. The governing body of Team Ghana is the Ghana Football Association. The first time Ghana qualified for the World Cup in 2006, she had the youngest team in the tournament. (Wikipedia) In 2006, Ghana in Group E, played matches against Italy, the Czech Republic, and the USA. The match played against Italy was lost by 2-0. During the next match, team Ghana played against the Czech Republic and won 2-0. Team Ghana now had two goals in hand. The final group stage match was played against the United States of America and Ghana won this one by 2-1. However, we lost our next match with Brazil by 0-3. Ghana was the only African country in that year to make it to the round of 16 and was eliminated after the match with Brazil (Wikipedia). In this World Cup, two matches were won and two lost. Ghana was ranked 13th out of 32 by FIFA in that tournament which was impressive for Ghana as debutants (Wikipedia). In 2010, Ghana

The Discovery of crude oil in the Middle East changed their fortunes because of continuous demand for the commodity. Life does not exist without energy. In today’s world, fossil energy/crude oil is considered one of the most prominent energy sources with a large global market. Renewable energy is catching up. But obviously not fast enough in Ghana and many other places in the world. As it currently stands, everything is literally linked to the price of a litre of petrol or diesel. So when fuel price shifts, an entire economy shifts with it. Fuel prices have shifted. They’ve leapt and the entire country has reacted correspondingly. At a press event on March 24th, Ghana’s Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, said, “To mitigate the rising price of petroleum products at the pumps for the next three months, the government has decided to reduce margins in petroleum price build-up by a total of 15 pesewas per litre with effect from 1st of April.” Any increase in fuel pricing seems to affect every other price. This is because the increase in the petrol price leads to an increase in the cost of transportation, leading to overall inflation in the country. Hence, there is a direct impact on the citizen’s expenditures, import bills, savings, and the overall living standards of the people. There has been a massive increase in the petrol price in recent times, not just in Ghana. After COVID-19 and the reopening of the world, the demand and price for oil in Africa have skyrocketed, leading to adverse impacts on inflation, domestic budget, and economic savings. (Business insider Africa) Although some African countries have crude oil, our region is home to 5 out of 30 oil-producing countries in the world. Yet, not all these countries in the region produce crude oil. Further, the countries producing crude oil have certain strategic failures to address demand. (investpedia) There are local and international factors that impact oil prices and if these factors can be managed, the economic outlay of our African countries can be reduced. LOCAL FACTORS AFFECTING THE PETROL PRICES IN AFRICA 1. Operational incapability of oil-producing African countries The biggest problem with oil-producing African countries is mismanagement (and the c-word). It’s why oil-rich countries in Africa still need to import petroleum products into their country. It’s why a country can import crude oil from Europe and have it arrive “dirtier than black market fuel”. (investpedia) 2. Tax and levies implication on the petrol price The implication of taxes on the sale of petrol leads to a higher price. As the rate and number of the tax increases, the price of fuel increases. For instance, in 2019, there were about 12 different types of surcharges on petrol, leading to a higher price. These added up to about 40% (ghana business reviews). These taxes and levies include road fund levy, Energy debt recovery levy, energy sector recovery levy, special petroleum tax, distribution, marketing margin etc. Nevertheless, Government is in the process of negotiating some of these to reduce the price. That is why the announcement by the Finance Minister is in order. It might be temporary though till the prices in the international markets go back to normal.  3. Legal and security issues within local oil-producing countries On a broader spectrum, there have been security problems in major oil-producing countries like Nigeria during the last decade. It’s evident from the report of the US Energy Information administration that it was a security risk to explore and develop oil fields in the country. (investpedia) Further, most of the oil exploration activities are dependent on foreign companies. So, we are dependent on imports and foreign machinery work for our very own welfare. 4. Currency depreciation The import bill increases when the local currency depreciates. It’s simple to understand that when currency is weak, you have to pay more to import the product. The cedi has been depreciating in recent times. So, when cedi is converted into dollars, more cedi will be needed to make the product’s price. It’s also important to note that persistent depreciation is increasing because of a gap in imports and exports. The import bill exceeds the country’s exports, which weakens the local currency. We need to choose locally manufactured products where possible. It can help to boost the economic stability of the country. (norvanreports) INTERNATIONAL FACTORS AFFECTING OIL PRICE IN THE COUNTRY Russia is the third-largest oil-producing nation in the world after Saudi Arabia and the United States. Russia’s oil extraction capacity and supply ability are higher than most other oil-producing countries around the globe. And it has been a major oil supplier for the global oil market. However, a recent clash between Russia and Ukraine has created tension and uncertainty about the operational sustainability of its oil market. (iaee) It’s important to note that international sanctions on Russia aim to make it unable to find a buyer. The US and Canada have already banned oil purchases from Russia. The UK is about to do the same by the end of the year. So, there is global uncertainty regarding supply and what the future has to unfold. 2. Increasing economic activity throughout the world In 2020, this world witnessed zero oil prices in the international market due to reduced/no economic activity. However, oil price exceeded $100 per barrel in recent times due to increased economic activity.  The rise of petrol prices has triggered inflation throughout the world, not just Ghana. For instance, in the United States, the current inflation rate is 7.9% which is a massive increase compared to 1.4% in 2020. Although it’s not entirely due to a hike in the oil price, it remains a major factor in boosting inflation. (ycharts) The use of crude oil is not limited to transportation and mechanical energy. Many petrol products are used as the main component in a wide range of products like electricity, chemicals, synthetic material, road oil, feedstocks, and many other mass consumer products. 3. Limited supplying capacity It’s important to note that although there are deep reserves for oil globally,