EPA The Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) are being negotiated between the EU and 75 ACP countries, including

Ghana. EPAs are essentially free trade agreements, which will overhaul the entire way in which African countries trade relations are structured with their largest trading partner, the EU. The new arrangement will succeed the trade provisions of the Cotonou Agreement and is set to come into force in January 2008. While Ghana has sustained improved rates of growth and human development, it remains a low-income country with significant numbers of people living in poverty and thus requires the policy space to tailor its development policies to meet its specific challenges and priorities. Assessing the impact of an EPA on Ghanas economy is not straightforward given that what will go into the agreement is still under negotiation. In addition, what the agreement must include for it to be compatible with World Trade Organization (WTO) rules remains ambiguous due to the stalling of the Doha Round, which was slated to clarify the special and differential treatment developing countries are entitled to in concluding regional trade agreements. Notwithstanding this, the proposed EPA framework that the EU is currently pushing for in negotiations has raised serious concerns about the impact an EPA will have on Ghanas efforts towards poverty eradication, regional integration and economic development.

Economic Partnership Agreements are a scheme to create a free trade area (FTA) between the European Commission of the European Union and the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP) countries. They are a response to continuing criticism that the non-reciprocal and discriminating preferential trade agreements offered by the EU are incompatible with WTO rules. The EPAs are a key element of the Cotonou Agreement, the latest agreement in the history of ACPEU Development Cooperation and are to take effect as of 2008.

HIPC BENEFITS

Promoting growth, reducing poverty. To begin with, the HIPC Initiative is an arrangement in which a country with a high debt burden engages in a joint project with its major international creditors to reduce the debt burden and to tackle poverty. How does this happen? A country with a high debt burden spends a large part of its annual revenue to service debts. The consequence is that very little is left for investment into social services, so poverty in the country gets worse. In the HIPC Initiative, the international creditors agree to erase the debts of the HIPC country over time so that the huge resources that would have gone into debt servicing are channeled into poverty reduction. It is these resources that are referred to as HIPC Savings or HIPC Funds.

What is required of the debtor country in the HIPC Initiative is that it draws up a poverty reduction strategy and uses the HIPC Funds to finance it. Of course, once a country signs up to the Initiative, it is discouraged from taking international loans that do not have significant grant element (currently 35% for many of the countries). The broader rule is that the country takes steps to keep its debt at sustainable levels.

Why did Ghana have to go HIPC? In the year 2000, our total debt obligation (TDO) exceeded the amount of goods and services we produced that year (TDO/GDP ratio hit 103%). In that year, a third of the countrys expenditure went into debt servicing. The result was that investments into social services reduced progressively. Clearly, our debt burden had become unsustainable. We were heading for doom. In total, Ghana will save about 34 trillion cedis over a twenty year period. So far, almost 6 trillion cedis has been disbursed for various poverty reduction projects. Every year, the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning calculates the expected accruals from the countrys HIPC Savings and puts the money in the HIPC Account at the Bank of Ghana. The Ministry then puts this amount and the intended use in the annual budget for parliamentary debate and approval. Please

AGOA The African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) was signed into law on May 18, 2000 as Title 1 of The Trade and Development Act of 2000. The Act offers tangible incentives for African countries to continue their efforts to open their economies and build free markets.

AGOA provides trade preferences for quota and duty-free entry into the United States for certain goods, expanding the benefits under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program. Notably, AGOA expanded market access for textile and apparel goods into the United States for eligible countries. This resulted in the growth of an apparel industry in southern Africa, and created hundreds of thousands of jobs. However, the dismantling of the Multi Fibre Agreement's world quota regime for textile and apparel trade in January 2005 reversed some of the gains made in the African textile industry due to increased competition from developing nations outside of Africa, particularly China. Already, many factories have been shut down in Lesotho, where most of the growth occurred. However, following the imposition of certain safeguard measures by US authorities, orders from African manufacturers stabilised somewhat. Still, Africa is the only region that has in fact a reduced share of the US apparel import market following the phasing out of quotas. AGOA has resulted in limited successes in some countries. In addition to growth in the textile and apparel industry, some AGOA countries have begun to export new products to the United States, such as cut flowers, horticultural products, automotives and steel. While Nigeria and Angola are the largest exporters under AGOA, South Africa's have been the most diverse and unlike the former are not mainly concentrated in the energy sector. To some countries, including Lesotho, Swaziland, Kenya and Madagascar, AGOA remains of critical importance. Agricultural products is a promising area for AGOA trade, however much work needs to be done to assist African countries in meeting U.S. sanitary and phytosanitary standards. The U.S. government is providing technical assistance to AGOA eligible countries to help them benefit from the legislation, through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and other agencies. The U.S. government has established three regional trade hubs in Africa for this purpose, in Accra, Ghana; Gaborone, Botswana; and Nairobi, Kenya.
MDG
Adopted by world leaders in the year 2000 and set to be achieved by 2015, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) provide concrete, numerical benchmarks for tackling extreme poverty in its many dimensions. The MDGs also provide a framework for the entire international community to work together towards a

common end making sure that human development reaches everyone, everywhere. If these goals are achieved, world poverty will be cut by half, tens of millions of lives will be saved, and billions more people will have the opportunity to benefit from the global economy. The eight MDGs break down into 21 quantifiable targets that are measured by 60 indicators.

Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger Target 1a: Reduce by half the proportion of people living on less than a dollar a day

1.1 Proportion of population below $1 (PPP) per day 1.2 Poverty gap ratio 1.3 Share of poorest quintile in national consumption

Target 1b: Achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all, including women and young people

1.4 Growth rate of GDP per person employed 1.5 Employment-to-population ratio 1.6 Proportion of employed people living below $1 (PPP) per day 1.7 Proportion of own-account and contributing family workers in total employment

Target 1c: Reduce by half the proportion of people who suffer from hunger

1.8 Prevalence of underweight children under-five years of age 1.9 Proportion of population below minimum level of dietary energy consumption

Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education Target 2a: Ensure that all boys and girls complete a full course of primary schooling

2.1 Net enrolment ratio in primary education 2.2 Proportion of pupils starting grade 1 who reach last grade of primary 2.3 Literacy rate of 15-24 year-olds, women and men

Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women Target 3a: Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005, and at all levels by 2015

3.1 Ratios of girls to boys in primary, secondary and tertiary education 3.2 Share of women in wage employment in the non-agricultural sector 3.3 Proportion of seats held by women in national parliament

Goal 4: Reduce child mortality Target 4a: Reduce by two thirds the mortality rate among children under five 4.1 Under-five mortality rate

4.2 Infant mortality rate 4.3 Proportion of 1 year-old children immunized against measles

Goal 5: Improve maternal health 5.1 Maternal mortality ratio 5.2 Proportion of births attended by skilled health personnel

Target 5b: Achieve, by 2015, universal access to reproductive health

5.3 Contraceptive prevalence rate 5.4 Adolescent birth rate 5.5 Antenatal care coverage (at least one visit and at least four visits) 5.6 Unmet need for family planning

Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases Target 6a: Halt and begin to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS

6.1 HIV prevalence among population aged 15-24 years 6.2 Condom use at last high-risk sex 6.3 Proportion of population aged 15-24 years with comprehensive correct knowledge of HIV/AIDS 6.4 Ratio of school attendance of orphans to school attendance of non-orphans aged 10-14 years

Target 6b: Achieve, by 2010, universal access to treatment for HIV/AIDS for all those who need it

6.5 Proportion of population with advanced HIV infection with access to antiretroviral drugs

Target 6c: Halt and begin to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases

6.6 Incidence and death rates associated with malaria 6.7 Proportion of children under 5 sleeping under insecticide-treated bednets 6.8 Proportion of children under 5 with fever who are treated with appropriate antimalarial drugs 6.9 Incidence, prevalence and death rates associated with tuberculosis 6.10 Proportion of tuberculosis cases detected and cured under directly observed treatment short course

Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability country policies and programmes; reverse loss of environmental resources Target 7b: Reduce biodiversity loss, achieving, by 2010, a significant reduction in the rate of loss

Target 7a and 7b Indicators:

7.1 Proportion of land area covered by forest 7.2 CO2 emissions, total, per capita and per $1 GDP (PPP) 7.3 Consumption of ozone-depleting substances 7.4 Proportion of fish stocks within safe biological limits 7.5 Proportion of total water resources used 7.6 Proportion of terrestrial and marine areas protected 7.7 Proportion of species threatened with extinction

Target 7c: Reduce by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation

7.8 Proportion of population using an improved drinking water source 7.9 Proportion of population using an improved sanitation facility

Target 7d: Achieve significant improvement in lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers, by 2020

7.10 Proportion of urban population living in slums

Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development Target 8a: Develop further an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system Includes a commitment to good governance, development and poverty reduction; both nationally and internationally Target 8b: Address the special needs of the least developed countries Includes tariff and quota free access for the least developed countries' exports; enhanced programme of debt relief for heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC) and cancellation of official bilateral debt; and more generous ODA for countries committed to poverty reduction Target 8c: Address the special needs of landlocked developing countries and Small Island developing States through the Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States and the outcome of the twenty-second special session of the General Assembly Target 8d: Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries through national and international measures in order to make debt sustainable in the long term.

EPA

The Environmental Protection Agency is the leading public body for protecting and improving the environment in Ghana. It's our job to make sure that air, land and water are looked after by everyone in today's society, so that tomorrow's generations inherit a cleaner, healthier world. We have more than 30 years of history behind us. We have offices across Ghana working on and carrying out Government policy, inspecting and regulating businesses and reacting when there is an emergency such as a pollution incident. A 13-member board of directors, appointed by the President of Ghana, supervises our operations. However, the management of our day-to-day operations is directly under an Executive Director and seven divisional heads (Directors). EPAs Corporate Objectives EPA seeks to:

Create awareness to mainstream environment into the development process at the national, regional, district and community levels; Ensure that the implementation of environmental policy and planning are integrated and consistent with the countrys desire for effective, long-term maintenance of environmental quality; Ensure environmentally sound and efficient use of both renewable and nonrenewable resources in the process of national development; Guide development to prevent, reduce, and as far as possible, eliminate pollution and actions that lower the quality of life; To apply the legal processes in a fair, equitable manner to ensure responsible environmental behaviour in the country; Continuously improve EPAs performance to meet changing environmental trends and community aspirations; Encourage and reward a commitment by all EPA staff to a culture based on continuous improvement and on working in partnership with all members of the Ghanaian community

SAP
Beginning in the early 1980s, through to the mid 1990s attempts were made to rebuild the government and restore Ghanas tarnished image. The reconstruction efforts fell under the application of IMF and World Bank sponsored Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs). SAPs were born as a result of a debt crisis that has hit especially developing countries since the 1980s. This debt crisis has its origin in the early 1970s when oil-producing countries that had united in the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) increased the oil price to gain additional revenue. Most of these profits were invested with banks in industrialised countries. These banks, in turn, were interested to lend this money to developing countries to finance the purchase of products from the industrialized countries. In this way, the loans given to developing countries helped to stimulate production in that time. Both private and public institutions encouraged the South to borrow. Even the World Bank preached the doctrine of debt as the path towards accelerated development. As a result, huge amounts were borrowed by the political elites, often wasted on luxuries, white elephant projects or stolen by corrupt officials. Very little was invested productively with a view of achieving sustainable economic growth. During the 1970s loans were given freely at very low interest rates but this situation changed dramatically in the early 1980s. The USA pushed up interest rates drastically in an attempt to stop inflation. Developing countries that had taken out loans with US banks now had to pay huge interests. The major lending banks in Europe followed suit and the debt crisis was born. Developing countries were unable to repay their loans and were forced to take up new loans to pay the interest.