Impact of road investments on the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals: the case of selected feeder roads in Ghana

The objective of this study was to assess the impacts of feeder road investments on poverty reduction and the achievement of the MDGs on health and education. To achieve the objective, data were collected from four interventions (treated) and four control (untreated) corridors in four districts; two each from the Brong Ahafo and Ashanti regions. Communities along these corridors were subsequently selected and simple random sampling used to interview 985 households from the intervention (treated) with 124 households along the control (untreated) corridors. These sets of road corridors share common characteristics with the only difference between them being the treatment received, and they were used to assess the impacts the road improvement have had on their economic activities as well as their access to social services such as health and education. This is because physical inaccessibility affects school attendance, frequency of visit by supervisors and completion rate of school children. In the same manner, access to health and use of modern treatment is equally constrained, with women and children being the most affected; thus hindering the achievement of the MDGs on health and education. The study revealed that reduction in travel time to input and output markets greatly impacted households living on the improved roads which boosted the economic participation of rural dwellers as majority are employed in agriculture. Improved corridors facilitated access to transport services which led to reduction in transport cost to input markets and technology, which in turn increased productivity and boosted crop output levels which generated significant incomes for the households. The study further indicated that improved roads impacted positively on non-agricultural employment; specifically in the service informal sector. It was also revealed that income earned reflected in households’ increased consumption, as expenditure outstripped incomes which implied the inability of households to save because they usually operated a deficit budget. The rise in consumption is a positive sign as this will help improve their nutritional level to reduce their susceptibility to illness. The study also recorded significant reduction in travel time to access health and education facilities, particularly clinics and primary education respectively. The study further indicated that road improvements also encouraged girls’ enrolment in school and women’s access to non-agricultural employment. Improvements in the road corridor also resulted in increases in average daily traffic volumes for motorized and non-motorized transport vehicles. These increases were more significant along the improved corridors than on the control corridors. In light of these findings appropriate recommendations have been presented to sustain the revealed positive impacts in the study area. The study has contributed to the global knowledge base in rural transport with the most significant finding being the “unintended and personal impacts of rural road investments”. The study found that impacts of roads are seen from a personal and everyday perspective by many of the respondents. They used their own everyday life to measure the impact of the road on their life. This is a complete departure from what is known in the literature on rural transport. The study also revealed that, there was improvement in girls’ enrolment at the primary level along the improved road corridor. In addition, households along the intervention corridor had better access in the form of reduced travel time to healthcare facilities; specifically clinics. The study is unclear about whether there are variations in impacts from maintaining a poorly deteriorated road and a moderately deteriorated one. This is clearly an area for further research. The study reasserts that providing access to road is but only one aspect of addressing the access problem of rural dwellers but the mobility component remains unresolved as the provision of transport services is controlled primarily by the private sector. For rural dwellers to fully benefit from road improvements, such improvements must have sufficient, efficient and affordable transport services as well as the appropriate location of facilities to improve rural households’ welfare, reduce their poverty levels and eventually lead to the realization of the MDGs. In short, rural transport investments have contributed and shown the relationship between road improvements and the achievement of the MDGs, especially in health and education, but the impacts could have been substantial had such investments been consciously mainstreamed into the design of the entire programme.

Source: KNUST