• A chaos/complexity theory approach to marketing in the turbulent South African business environment.

      Mason, Roger B. (San Diego: University Readers, 2007)
      This book consists of articles selected by the editors from the papers presented at the 2006 Leadership & Management Studies in Sub-Sahara Africa Conferences in Stone Town, Zanzibar. Conferences are presented by a voluntary association of individuals interested in improving the leadership and management competencies of Africans. Volume I details the association’s initial efforts consisting of empirical and theoretical research investigations and reviews of studies in the area. Topics range from core leadership issues, problems in management and leadership education, and business competitiveness to an exploration of the historical context of Sub-Sahara Africa. Coupled with the research data and theoretical concepts presented in the selected articles, this volume presents an in-depth look into the strategies directed to address these issues.
    • An Economic Assessment of the Institution of Land Use Planning in the Cities of Sub-Saharan Africa

      Egbu, Anthony; Antwi, Adarkwah; Olomolaiye, Paul (RICS (Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors), 2006)
      The institutions of land use planning in the countries of sub-Saharan Africa have come of age. For more than 40 years, the received colonial town planning laws and associated regulations have guided urban land development processes in the region. In spite of the problems of ‘illegal’ developments and delays in the procedures for obtaining land and development rights, no economic assessment of the system of land use planning in Africa seems to have been attempted. This paper analyses the impact of land use planning on urban development and examines the incentive structure of the political market of planning in the cities of sub-Saharan Africa. The objective is to identify the institutional weakness of land use planning in the region. The paper concludes that it would appear the system of land use planning in sub-Saharan Africa operates in such a way that allows the externalisation of costs onto those actors of the society whose interests are not sufficiently represented within the land use planning system. (RICS)
    • Compulsory Land Acquisition in Ghana - Policy and Praxis

      Larbi, Wordsworth Odami; Antwi, Adarkwah; Olomolaiye, Paul (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2004)
      Compulsory land acquisition powers have been used extensively in Ghana since colonial times, as the main means of the state's access to land for development. The underlying principle is supremacy of the state over people and their private property, and is aimed at providing land for public and social amenities, correcting economic and social inefficiencies in private market operations and providing greater equity and social justice in the distribution of land. The paper analyses compulsory acquisition practice in Ghana in the light of these principles. It argues that few of the presumed principles have been met. Rather compulsory land acquisition has resulted in adverse socio-economic consequences including in landlessness, poverty and heightened tension in state-community relationship. The paper advocates for a new legal and institutional environment for employing compulsory acquisition powers.
    • Consumer Protection Awareness in South Africa

      Mason, Roger B. (World Research Organization, 2007)
      This paper addresses the lack of knowledge about awareness of consumer protection in South Africa, especially amongst disadvantaged consumers. Literature shows that there is a high correlation between the level of economic development and the awareness of consumer rights. The more developed a country is, the more aware its people will be in terms of their consumer rights. The less developed a country is, the lower the level of consumer rights awareness consumers will have. Consumers, like any other citizens of a country, have a right to be protected by the law. Private and nongovernmental organisations and the consumer councils should to ensure that the interests and rights of consumers are well protected. The study involved a literature review and an exploratory empirical study into the effect of income and education on awareness of consumer protection by a sample of Durban consumers. A strong, positive relationship between consumer protection awareness and income and education was found. Recommendations for actions which should improve consumer protection awareness amongst low income, poorly educated consumers, are suggested in, this study, while, further research to develop a deeper understanding of the problem, and are also suggested.
    • A contextual understanding of youth of entrepreneurship education outcomes in Sub-Saharan Africa

      Anosike, Paschal (Academy of Management, 2020-07-29)
      Prompted by growing emphasis, particularly in Africa where poverty and conflict have been associated with high youth unemployment, to use entrepreneurship education to influence young people’s post-study intentions, this paper articulates the effect of entrepreneurship education on entrepreneurial intention amongst students and graduates from two higher education institutions affected by the on-going conflict in northern Nigeria. By relying on systematic analysis following semi-structured interviews, the findings showed that newly acquired knowledge and skills in use of market intelligence, business plan writing and record-keeping were not only linked with entrepreneurial intentions, but it also emerged that the volatile context of the business environment influenced strategic decisions related to new business growth and survival. Future research and policy implications were considered based on the findings.
    • Customary Landholding Institutions and Housing Development in Urban Centres of Ghana : Case Studies of Kumasi and Wa

      Abdulai, Raymond Talinbe; Ndekugri, Issaka E. (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2007)
      In Ghana, land is vested in families and chiefs in the traditional land sector. These corporate bodies, referred to as customary landholding institutions control over 90% of the total land area in the country. The institutions therefore govern access to land. Urban centres in Ghana are plagued with a plethora of problems and one of them is inadequate housing. The urban housing problem is partly attributed to the existence and operation of the institutions. The customary landholding system is perceived as communal landownership, which does not permit individual ownership. It is thus argued that the system does not provide incentives for investing in housing development. This paper reports on a study carried out to test the assertion that the system does not permit individual ownership using two urban centres as case studies. The analysis shows that the operation of the institutions permits individual landownership. The traditional landownership system cannot therefore be the cause of the urban housing problem based on the premise that it does not permit individual ownership of land rights.
    • Entrepreneurship education as human capital: implications for youth self-employment and conflict mitigation in sub-Saharan Africa

      Anosike, Paschal (Sage, 2018-11-15)
      Previous research has focused on stable developed economies to predict that human capital and entrepreneurship education (EE) provision at the higher education (HE) level will positively affect entrepreneurial success. This article draws on the outcome of recent EE projects in two HE institutions in a conflict-torn northern Nigeria as a proxy to advocate the introduction of entrepreneurship as a compulsory component into the secondary school curriculum in Sub-Saharan Africa. Using semi-structured interview data, it is found that the provision of EE at secondary education level could help to facilitate human capital development and assist efforts to curb youth unemployment. Specifically, the study suggests that EE comprises both generic and specific human capital that increases an individual’s ability to identify and exploit opportunities, particularly for young people, and in doing so helps to reduce their vulnerability to poverty and involvement in armed conflict. Suggestions for future research and policy considerations are provided.
    • Higher education contexts of entrepreneurship education outcomes in Sub-Saharan Africa

      Anosike, Paschal; Oluwatobi, Stephen (North American Business Press, 2021-06-02)
      Motivated by the growing emphasis to influence young people’s post-study career intentions through entrepreneurship education, particularly in Africa where poverty and conflict have been associated with high youth unemployment, this paper articulates the effect of entrepreneurship education on entrepreneurial intention amongst students and graduates from two higher education institutions in conflict-torn northern Nigeria. By relying on systematic analysis following semi-structured interviews, the findings showed that newly acquired knowledge and skills in use of market intelligence, business plan writing and record-keeping were not only linked with entrepreneurial intentions, but it also emerged that the volatile context of the business environment influenced strategic decisions related to new business growth and survival. Research and policy implications were considered based on the findings.
    • Institutional and Social Factors Influencing Informal Sector Activity in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Nigerian Case Study

      Joshua Adike, Abinotam (2018)
      The extant entrepreneurship literature is replete with competing narratives about the concept of informal sector (IS). Also, IS’ potential as a source of income and the behavioural tendencies of operators in the sector remain highly contested but under-researched. In particular, not much is known about the incentives and the motivations for engaging in informal economic activity from the perspective of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) context where a significant proportion of all economic activities are informal. Thus, the lack of conceptual clarity and consensus about the underlying factors driving individuals into informal economic activity constitutes a major knowledge gap. To fill this gap, this study seeks to clarify the domain of IS from a SSA viewpoint, and through this paves the way for a more holistic understanding of the behavioural tendencies and motivations of IS operators in SSA. Specifically relying on the institutional, social exclusion, and personality trait theoretical frameworks, the study demonstrates how a combination of separate yet related phenomena of personality traits, institutional factors, and more importantly, situational factors that manifest as perceptions of social exclusion serve as the incentives and the motivations to engage in informal economic activity in SSA. To achieve its goal, qualitative primary data obtained through thirty-eight semi-structured interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed using Nvivo. Firstly, the study found that institutional ambiguity, institutional delinquency, institutional passivity, and institutional incongruence are sources of voids in Nigeria's institutional framework that influence an individual to enter the IS. Secondly, social exclusion regarding lack of access to requirements such as finance and formal education to start and sustainably operate a business influences people to enter into the IS. Lastly, the findings indicate that personality traits’ influence regarding the decision to engage in informal economic activities is dependent on individual circumstances. These are valuable contributions to the stock of knowledge about the IS. Particularly, the identification and categorisation of four specific institutional voids and partitioning of the sources of exclusion; the finding that in adverse economic circumstances personality traits could influence potential opportunity-entrepreneurs to start-up in the IS; the finding about the role of trade associations; and the new understanding about the collaborative dimension of corruption in the context of IS practice, represent a significant contribution of this study. These contributions are valuable not just in terms of creating new windows of research opportunities, but also for evidence-based policy relating to the IS that is appropriately targeted at relevant groups. This is in addition to facilitating collaborations for business support, enlightenment, improved business practice, and inclusive growth.
    • Is Land Title Registration the Answer to Insecure and Uncertain Property Rights in Sub-Saharan Africa?

      Abdulai, Raymond Talinbe (RICS (The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors), 2006)
      The importance of security and certainty of land tenure cannot be overemphasized. A key justification for it is that it provides incentives for investment in land and therefore an impetus for sustainable economic development. In the customary land sector in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), land is vested in communities represented by families/clans, tribes and chiefs. These families/clans, tribes and chiefs are commonly referred to as traditional landholding institutions. It is, however, believed that property rights to land emanating from these institutions are insecure and uncertain, implying a disincentive to investment and therefore a barrier to economic development. This belief appears to be premised on the fact that customary ownership of land is not formally recorded or registered. Thus, since the colonial era, governments have been embarking on various land title registration programmes supposedly to guarantee greater security and certainty of customary land tenure for sustainable development. Evidence, however, abounds in the sub region to indicate that: (a) land title registration has done little to guarantee security and certainty of land tenure; and (b) there is no clearly discernible link between land title registration and investment behaviour. These form the basis of the thesis pursued in this paper. The paper argues that increasing security and certainty of land tenure does not necessarily require the registration of land titles and therefore defines the ingredients of secure and certain land rights. (RICS)
    • Measuring the Economic Impacts of Sub-Saharan African Urban Real-Estate Policies: Methodological Discussions

      Hammond, Felix Nikoi (RICS (Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors), 2006)
      In recent times, the approaches used to the modelling of the economic impacts of exogenous interventions have become increasingly sophisticated. However, even though huge resources have been expended on developing and implementing development programmes in sub-Saharan Africa, many of which have a significant real estate component, little effort has been made to assess in any rigorous sense their true impacts. This paper presents a quantitative framework by which the impacts of these real estate policies can be more objectively ascertained. The framework devised in this paper harnessed the strengths of a number of existing conventional models that are popular in the west to evolve a hybrid model that has due regard for the generally noisy data conditions of sub-Saharan Africa. The formulated framework is portable across the respective countries of Africa and the developing world. (RICS)
    • Prospects and challenges for empowering female entrepreneurs in Africa – a Nigerian case study

      Anosike, Paschal; Firth, Janet; Nkanta, Inyene; University of Wolverhampton Business School, Faculty of Arts, Business and Social Sciences (University of Wolverhampton, 2023)
      This study explores and investigates the prospects and challenges female entrepreneurs face in Nigeria and how they can be empowered to contribute more to economic development. The focus is to understand why many female entrepreneurs in Nigeria are primarily concentrated in the informal sector compared to their male counterparts who are dominating the formal industry and how these women can be empowered to engage more in business enterprises in the formal sector, which is believed to generate more revenue and income. Hence, women can contribute more to Nigeria's economic development. Using a qualitative methodological approach, including data was collected through semi-structured virtual interviews with twenty purposively sampled female entrepreneurs in Nigeria who have been in business for five years and above. Transcribed interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis. Five thematic categories that encompassed five themes emerged with sub-themes. This study found evidence to suggest that Nigerian female entrepreneurs yearn for effective human capital development, particularly in entrepreneurship education, training, networking, and mentorship, to overcome many barriers to sustaining a profitable business enterprise in the formal sector of the economy. The study found evidence that female entrepreneurs in Nigeria lack access to financial and human capital, which limits and impede them from running their businesses in the formal sector as they have mindset constraints such as risk aversion and have not been adequately equipped with entrepreneurial education, training, and soft skills such as business and leadership skills. In addition, this study found that Nigerian women have culturally imposed constraints that psychologically impede their independence, aspiration, and priorities. This study reveals that when women cross over into male-dominated sectors, they can earn more compared to the earnings they make from the traditionally female-dominated sectors. The core conclusion and implications from these limited research findings suggest that empowering female entrepreneurs to succeed in practice, particularly in the male-dominated sector, would require exposing women to human capital development, such as entrepreneurial education and training in business. This approach will promote the development of entrepreneurial skills to provide new paths and ambitions for women and the ability to negotiate their rights in socioeconomic activities. The Policymakers and the Nigerian Government can take steps towards enforcing the laws which appear to be dormant, as the policies and programs concerning women’s economic empowerment need to be properly and regularly investigated and evaluated to ascertain that their primal roles are being met. Hence, there is a need to disabuse investors' minds and spearhead them toward investing in women’s entrepreneurship. This can be done by offering more substantial tailored financial support for women entrepreneurs with growth-oriented businesses, including venture capital investment. The sampling and a single country context were significant limitations of this study. Twenty Nigerian female entrepreneurs engaged in this study. Their circumstances, barriers faced, and strategies utilized may be peculiar to specific settings and localities, mainly limited to only seven business sectors. The perceptions of these participants may not reflect or represent the views of all female entrepreneurs in Nigeria. Also, some findings may need to be replicated and transferable to other national cultures, countries, or situations, as nations and regions have different cultures, values, and beliefs, particularly about women, which may have a differential impact on entrepreneurial operations.
    • The Political Economy of Sub-Saharan Africa Land Policies

      Hammond, Felix Nikoi; Antwi, Adarkwah; Proverbs, David G. (American Review of Political Economy, 2006)
      The quest for African poverty alleviation has become a global issue and governments of rich nations have registered their commitment to the task both through the Millennium Development Goals and other international programs. While poverty is endemic in Africa, extant policies that continue to dictate proceedings in the land sectors of most African nations have been constructed in a way that concentrate benefits and wealth on a few while spreading costs and poverty on a larger segment of the African population. These policies which continue to impose greater restrictions on poverty alleviation have emanated from the peculiar political and economic history of Africa. An understanding of how these political events continue to shape the performance of land markets in these countries within the context of contemporary economic learning is thus key to understanding the policy directions required for success. This paper thus employs public policy and transaction costs insights to explicate the historical political events that have led to the promulgation of such policies together with a conceptual view of their social cost implications.
    • The Social Costs of Real-Estate Market Information Gaps in Ghana

      Hammond, Felix Nikoi (Routledge (Taylor & Francis), 2006)
      Real estate markets function efficiently when driven by information regimes in which legitimate information corresponds with information that must count in market decisions. Where there are mismatches between legitimate information and information that must count, gaps naturally emerge in the information order. If the conditions for the creation and widening of such gaps are not removed, tenure insecurity, real estate transaction constraints and social costs tend to be heightened. This article presents a view of the conditions that have created information gaps in the Ghanaian real estate economy together with their allied tenure insecurity and social costs. Propositions for alleviating these information gaps are consequently proffered. (Routledge)
    • Traditional Landholding Institutions and Individual Ownership of Land Rights in Sub-Saharan Africa

      Abdulai, Raymond Talinbe; Antwi, Adarkwah (InderScience Publishers, 2005)
      As first level suppliers, land is vested in indigenous corporate bodies like clans/families, tribes and chiefs in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The corporate bodies are called traditional landholding institutions. This socio-political arrangement of landownership has, however, been described as communal landholding which does not permit individual ownership of land rights and this, it is argued, impedes economic development. This paper critically examines the customary land tenure systems and concludes that they are composite with communal as well as individual landownership akin to what obtains in England. Traditional landownership systems in SSA do not appear to constrain individual ownership of land rights. (InderScience Publishers)
    • Transforming Africa's socio-economic landscape through entrepreneurialism

      Anosike, Paschal (Africa Policy Review, 2017-07-31)