Education sector tired of reforms — Prof. Ewusi

By Edmund Smith-Asante, ACCRA

Minister of Education, Prof Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang

Ghana's education sector is currently experiencing reform fatigue as a result of the many interventions introduced by various governments and the Ghana Education Service (GES), a professor in econometrics, Prof Kodwo Ewusi, has said.

Prof Ewusi, the Dean of Graduate Studies at the Methodist University College, has, therefore, proposed that any such reform should be based on the present system, “and correct it to make it work”.

He was, however, optimistic that with the right approach, Ghana’s education sector would pick up once again.

Speaking last Tuesday at the three-day 48th edition of the J. B. Danquah Memorial Lectures on the topic “Human Capital and Economic Growth in Ghana”, he cited the influence of donors on the country’s educational system as the main cause of the reform fatigue.

He indicated that whereas donors always demanded more investment in primary education, research had shown that returns were highest from investment in university education, listing them as 15 per cent for university, seven per cent for secondary and five per cent for primary education. 

Educational reforms

Sharing the findings of a study, he said after running an analysis of reforms since 1988, he could say that “the Ghana Educational Sector is reform fatigued. It has had too many reforms and the reforms did not perform so well”. 

Prof. Ewusi said for the period of the study (1970 to 2013), the average percentage of physical capital was 15.94 per cent, educational investment was 20.45 per cent, health was 3.18 per cent and human capital investment 6.60 per cent.

He said educational capital increased from 1.45 per cent to 11.41 per cent and health capital, 0.35 per cent to 7.02 per cent, but physical capital rose from 3.38 per cent to 30 per cent.

There was not much investment in educational, health and human capital during the period, he said, calling it the period of decadence. 

According to Prof. Ewusi, it was found out that the model of education was not working properly.

Education/ health 

Prof. Ewusi stressed the importance of education and health and said if they attracted more investment they would produce more outcome.

“We started the 70s running down our educational system and our health system and that is what has affected our results,” he contended.

Comparing the inroads made by Malaysia in its economic advancement to that of Ghana, Prof. Ewusi said that country adopted a perspective plan in 1990 named 2020, adding that they went ahead of Ghana which adopted its Vision 2020 plan in 1995 and discarded it after five years.

“With the problems we have now, in 2015 we think that the economy will grow by 3.5 per cent at best. That is if our infrastructure improves. If it doesn’t improve we project that it will grow by only 3 per cent,” he added.

Writer’s email: edmund.asante@graphic.com.gh

This story was first published by the Daily Graphic on February 25, 2015