Foreign Aid In Ghana Essay

Different cultures, countries, religions, and community with various behaviors and rituals that guides their belief and action when a loved one pass away. Religious and spiritual belief, type of life after death, superstitious beliefs after death and beliefs towards the meaning of life are all based on tradition and death ritual.

Culture is one of the most relevant elements that can define not only a society but also a country’s cumulative beliefs and system. Often noted as the origins of a country, culture is definitive in the sense that it harbors all the elements that can provide justification on the traditions and norms set by the society for its members. More often than not, the society members follow norms in order to create a harmonious community, and the beliefs and the traditions serve as the poles or grounding rules for each member to follow. Culture is very dynamic in the way that it can change over a variety of foreign influences but what is permanent about it is that original elements about it often lingers with the influences, therefore making it multi-faceted and broad. More importantly, culture serves as an individual and unique trait each society has, and therefore sets it apart from other countries and other societies.

The relationship between the geography of West Africa and the development of the Kingdom of Ghana go hand in hand. It was a great place for civilization because it flourished over time. The Kingdom of Ghana’s development was helped because of trade and wealth.

In Africa, there were achievements in the empires and their cities before the Europeans arrived and maintained control. In the Kingdom of Ghana they had characteristics of powerful nations today and made fortunes due to the gold and salt trade. In the city of Timbuktu they had great stories, and developed the center of Art. There are also many other things that Africa achieved in.

City of Ghana consists of two towns lying on a plain, inhabited by Muslims, a mosque for Friday prayer, each having a prayer leaders.

The JSTOR Review by Kristian Hoelscher on the book Dead Aid elaborates how Moyo “half-right” in her critique of foreign aid nonetheless Hoelscher mentions how “her review is unfortunately shallow and lacking nuance” in the areas of acknowledging the successes of aid in Africa. Additionally, another review of JSTOR by S.U. Fwatshak reiterated how “aid could not have been the fundamental reason why Africa poor… African’s problem are rooted in a mosaic of a factors (157).” These two reviews provided to be good sources to shed light on the issues of foreign aid and to counter-balance the Moyo’s critique on aid. Lastly, the book is quite short with only one-hundred and eighty-three pages therefore it seemed so like some concepts needed to be elaborated more but were not. On the other hand, the reason I choose this as a source because it does a suitable job in showing the history of aid, speaking on aid effectiveness, and exemplifying the stagnant economic growth (e.g. ten percent Africans are living in poverty in the 1970s compared to seventy-percent now (Moyo 33)). While, I wished the book concentrated more in a section of Africa, such as Sub-Saharan, it was an insightful and factual

In the texts, the Kingdom of Ghana during the 6th and 12th centuries was a very vast Texas sized area north of the Senegal and Niger rivers. The kingdom had a very large population of 200,000 and depended on a diverse economy based on gold, farming, and international trade. In the texts, there were observations that were collected by a Muslim Spaniard named Al-Bakir, who traveled through the kingdom of Ghana in the 11thcentury. Al- Bakir discusses Ghana and how it is divided into two towns. The city itself was very fortified and had a huge fence like wall. The people of the towns wore wrappers of cotton, silk or brocade according to their means. Most men shaved their beards and women their heads. The kingdom was inhabited by Muslims and contained

During the mid-1000s, the Empire of Ghana was wealthy and powerful through its control of trade routes. The empire lasted for many centuries until it collapsed in the 1200s. Three major factors contributed to its end. These factors include invasion of other armies, overgrazing of animals, and internal rebellions within the empire.

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge claims that the foreign aid spending is just as essential to safety as defense programs spending, those programs are essential to diplomacy and targeting roots causes of terrorism.

The source of Ghana's wealth and power came from its land. Its land offered wells with water, where people were able to drink water and grow vegetables. Having water is one reason on how any society survives. However, the king of this society Tunka Manin was living a high life. This fifth century Ghana was basically wrapped in gold. The land’s significant reserves of gold allowed Ghana to trade with other societies and therefore becoming a very wealthy empire. This kingdom was so rich that its horses were covered with gold-embroidered materials. The religion of Islam took over the majority of the Kingdom of Mali by trade and social interaction. It did what many followers of certain religions wanted to do, such as Marco Polo wanting to convert the Mongols to Christianity but was not able to, by spreading it and also make an impact on both the people and the place. Ibn Battuta arrived at the city of Mali to see the Islam practices.

Ghana is a country located in the sub-region of Western Africa. This country has been a part of the deep history in Western African culture, and has held onto its roots even through times of persecution and hardship. Much of Ghana’s history has been handed down through oral and written sources, making it an even greater feat that their traditions are still around today (Stahl, “Making History in Banda”). The religious groups that reside in Ghana today are fairly diverse, but the traditional religions that have resided in Ghana for thousands of years are still alive and well. The religions certainly have changed over time, especially since the colonization of Ghana, but rituals are still performed by the traditional religions that subside

Ghana is looked upon as a beautiful place to travel and explore West African Culture, but what lies beneath the beautiful ocean and intriguing people is a story of the many hardships and struggles that were put into the formation of this fascinating place. Ghana was once a flourishing community off the coast of West Africa until trade relations caused turmoil between the Europeans and the Ghanaians. A man named Kwame Nkrumah is an original Ghanaian who supported Ghana being an independent nation in 1957. His journey was almost identical to the life of South African president Nelson Mandela. In order for Ghana to be an independent nation, there was a lot of deceitfulness and corruption that was done by not only the Europeans but the Ghanaian kings themselves. Also, after Ghana gained its independence, Nkrumah’s rule was not necessarily successful and lead to a weak economy.

Growing up in Ghana in the early to mid-nineties was very challenging for me and most people I came into contact with; yet provided the acumen to make sound personal and professional decisions. Ghana was recovering from an economic recession mainly attributed to series coup d’états that destabilized the economy and crippled most state institutions. As a result of this, the country experienced a protracted period of serious economic decline characterized by lax financial management, inflation rates well over 40%, extensive government involvement in the economy and an extremely high budget deficit. These weak macroeconomic fundamentals influenced the government’s decision to implement a series of strenuous public policies; with the goal to place Ghana back on sound economic and social footing.

Over the last 50 years, the world has struggled to maintain an economic balance and stability, while flourishing countries try to maintain a steady income to support its people and relations with other countries. Therefore, when a continent like Africa fails to maintain a stable government and economy, super powers such as America decide to intervene with its relations. Africa has great potential to become another pillar of the world’s economic structure with its mass amounts of uncultivated land. Unfortunately, corruption and irresponsible governments hinder that progress. Foreign aid while helpful should be limited to a yearly amount because it allows the government to repudiate responsibility and gives room for corruption; it creates a

Nigeria got their independence from Britain on 1st October, 1960. Within the country of Nigeria, they have over 371 tribes, but the main three that is well known are, Igbo, Hausa, and Yoruba. Within that 371 tribes, they have 521 language. Nigeria is well known for their petroleum, and they have other natural resources include natural gas, tin, iron ore, coal, limestone, niobium, lead, zinc and arable land. The maximum crude oil production capacity of Nigeria is 2.5 million barrels per day, and the whole world consume an average of about 19.4 million barrels per day. One might ask, what is the problem with a country with the maximum capacity of oil production at 2.5 million a day? The problem is that people in that country are living in poverty. According to the Food Aid International organization (FAI), “3000 adults and children die everyday of hunger and poverty,” (Xinhua). My research shows that there are many contributing factor why people are living in poverty, which are: Unemployment, bad education system, inequity, and corruption. But my research focuses on the leading cause of poverty in Nigeria, which is corruption within the government system. According to “BBC News,” it shows that almost 100 million people living in Nigeria lives under $1 a day.