Guri, Sanni
Description
This study investigates the implications of the Ghana Cocoa
Marketing Board's economic objectives on cocoa production in Ghana.
The realisation of the Board's objectives involves it in withholding
from the growers significant proportions of the annual proceeds from
the export of cocoa. All withdrawals, be they temporary or permanent,
are classified as taxes on the growers.
The taxation since the GCMB was created is more than that
required for optimal development of the industry. To reach...[Show more] this
conclusion the actual taxation is compared with a theoretical optimum
taxation computed along the lines suggested by Professor W. M. Corden
of Oxford University. Thus a rationalisation of taxation in the Ghana
cocoa industry is suggested to involve a cut in actual taxation by
9 per cent.
The main purpose of the thesis, which is to analyse the effect
of the GCMB's objectives, is discussed in Chapter 5 and a broad
spectrum of the world and Ghanaian cocoa industries is investigated.
This, it is hoped, will provide the context in which the argument
for optimal development of Ghanaian cocoa production is to be advanced.
The arrangement and contents of chapters are: (a) a survey of
the current world cocoa industry; (b) a survey of cocoa production and
the resources employed in Ghana; (c) a review of some important
attempts at estimating the Ghana cocoa supply function, and (d) the
cocoa marketing system in Ghana. Chapter 1 establishes that there currently exists a favourable
market condition for more cocoa to be supplied by producing nations .
On the other hand , Chapter 2 suggests that costs of production are
rising and that the current land and labour intensive techniques of
production are giving way to capital intensive techniques. Chapter 3
shows that Ghanaian cocoa producers are responsive to price incentives,
while Chapter 4 outlines the powerful position of the GCMB and the
objectives for which the Board stands.
Finally , the contradictions between the Board's objectives and
their implications for production and incomes are discussed in
Chapter 5.
Ghana is at an economic crossroads. Unless substantial new
developments of initiatives are undertaken. Gross National Product will
continue to increase at a rate slower than population increase -
meaning , at best , long term stagnation. This thesis argues for one
such initiative: a redistribution of income to cocoa farmers. This ,
it is argued, will so increase production that government revenues will
not fall in the long term,and increased export revenues and private
income will provide a capital basis for a diversified approach to Ghana's
economic development.
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