Access to and Control over Resources and Benefits

Gender roles also affect how men and women have access to and control over resources, benefits and decision-making. Having access means having the opportunity to use a resource or influence a decision but it does not mean having control over it.

Productive, reproductive and community management roles all require the use resources. Availability of resources to women engaged in work usually generates benefits for individuals, households, the communities and the District at large.

The gender and development approach to development requires sensitivity to women?s access to the resources needed for their work, their control over those resources to use as they wish, their access to the benefits gained from family and personal work, and to the control they have over the benefits.

Resources such as land, equipment, tools, labour, cash/credit, employable/income earning skills, employment, leadership, education and information, self-confidence and credibility and time are generally critical but scarce for women.

In the District, women have access to most of the resources they use to perform their roles, but no control over them. For instance, women have access to land, food, income, local political processes but no control over ownership, its allocation, how it can be spent and little influence and control over the nature of issues to be addressed and final decisions.

A study conducted reveals that access to and control of the District resources is skewed towards men. However, further disaggregation of the data shows, women control most of the productive roles (petty trading, fish smoking etc) are dominated by women. The Assembly therefore has to promote these sub-sectors to help bridge the gap in other roles especially in community management roles and political roles.

Manufacturing Industries

The district has quite a number of people in the manufacturing industry (11.5%) of which 4.0 percent are males and 19.1 percent are females. Wholesale and retail; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles is the third largest industry employing 11.4 percent. This is probably because the district has a vibrant market from which out-board motors for powering boats and canoes as well as motor vehicles and motor cycles for transporting of goods and materials to and from in the district are sold. The sector employs 5,726 people and is mostly dominated by females who constitute 17.1 percent with only 5.8 percent of them being males.

Energy

The major sources of energy for lighting in the communities in the District are Electricity (38.5%), Kerosene (27.1%), Flashlight/Torch light (33%) and Firewood (0.5%), Candles are however not in use. That for looking on the other hand includes firewood (64.8%), charcoal (31%) with other sources recording minimal figures in energy for cooking. Table 1.7 below illustrates the various sources of energy.

The persistent power outage (electricity main), inadequate supply and high cost of fuel for cooking and high poverty levels are some of the challenges mitigating against the use of environmentally friendly energy sources especially for cooking. The construction of a substation at Atebubu to serve surrounding districts will remedy the frequent power outages and boost small scale industries especially the Cold store operators, welding operators among others.

Oil and Gas

Pru West is one of the 32 identified districts for the potential onshore oil and gas exploration and development along the voltaian basin by SEA carried out by the Environmental Protection Agency. GNPC and relevant stakeholders have started gathering seismic data and information along the basin for further analysis. This has the potential of opening up the district to both local and foreign migrants. The district will be confronted with several development challenges that will affect communities and livelihood positively and negatively.

Management in view of this has to take proactive measures to ensure that existing natural resources are not jeopardized in the quest to exploit the oil and gas. Adequate compensations, capacity building and sensitization ought to be seriously considered among the local people in order to reduce its impact.

SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION (STI)

Science, technology and innovation (STI) are key drivers of economic and social development. The experience of successful developing countries shows that STI policies that are well integrated into national development strategies and combined with institutional and organizational changes can help raise productivity, improve firm competitiveness, support  faster growth and create jobs. 

To achieve this, policies need to address the specific features of innovation in developing countries. Examples include the weight of traditional sectors in the district, the importance of incremental and adaptive innovation, the need to identify, acquire and adapt foreign innovations, the particular role of foreign direct investment, the limited access of firms to skilled workers and to capital, weak technology-related infrastructure and inadequate intellectual property rights regimes.

STI policy for development focuses on supporting the integration of STI in district development strategies and building-up STI policy-making capacity in the district. As an Agrarian District with climate change at hand, to ensure food security in order to feed the growing population we need to adapt STI to increase production in the district. This can be done through the introduction of improved seed variety and drought resistant crops that will sustain the agriculture sector of the district.

SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION (STI)

Science, technology and innovation (STI) are key drivers of economic and social development. The experience of successful developing countries shows that STI policies that are well integrated into national development strategies and combined with institutional and organizational changes can help raise productivity, improve firm competitiveness, support faster growth and create jobs.

To achieve this, policies need to address the specific features of innovation in developing countries. Examples include the weight of traditional sectors in the district, the importance of incremental and adaptive innovation, the need to identify, acquire and adapt foreign innovations, the particular role of foreign direct investment, the limited access of firms to skilled workers and to capital, weak technology-related infrastructure and inadequate intellectual property rights regimes. STI policy for development focuses on supporting the integration of STI in district development strategies and building-up STI policy-making capacity in the district.

As an Agrarian District with climate change at hand, to ensure food security in order to feed the growing population we need to adapt STI to increase production in the district. This can be done through the introduction of improved seed variety and drought resistant crops that will sustain the agriculture sector of the district.