This paper assesses the degree to which the L’Aquila Food Security Initiative (AFSI) has been implemented in Ghana within the framework of managing for development results (MfDR), and to evaluate progress in various outcomes, including economic governance, agricultural growth, poverty, and food and nutrition security. The MfDR approach, which has gained widespread support globally for obtaining results, is endorsed by the government of Ghana and reflected in the Ghana Aid Policy and Strategy. The policy calls for demand-driven development cooperation with donor-coordinated support that is aligned to Ghana’s own national development strategies and priorities. The paper combines narratives, based on information collected from expert opinion surveys, and trends analysis of quantitative data, based on publicly available data and information, to address four research questions:
- What does a country-owned agricultural and rural development and food and nutrition security (ARD&FNS) strategy entail?
- To what extent are governments and their development partners providing financial and nonfinancial efforts toward these country-owned ARD&FNS strategies?
- How are these efforts being managed to achieve development results?
- To what extent are development results being achieved—that is, are outcome indicators trending in the expected directions toward stated targets?
The results section compares the situation prior to AFSI in 2009 with the situation afterward for several indicators related to the effort of the government of Ghana and of donors, and development outcomes. After drawing overall conclusions about the contribution of AFSI to observed changes, the paper makes suggestions for further studies.
Benin, Samuel, Tsitsi Makombe, and Michael Johnson. 2014. "Aid effectiveness in Ghana: How’s the L’Aquila food security initiative doing?" IFPRI Discussion Paper No. 01359.