Impact Analysis of Microfinance on Crop production in Ghana

This paper investigates the impact of microfinance on crop production in Ghana with specific reference to the East Mamprusi District (EMD) of Ghana. Using an ordinary least squares regression analysis, it also makes a quantitative estimation of the magnitude of the relationship between microfinance and crop production. For the analysis, the paper uses data from a sample of 100 respondents consisting of farmers who had accessed microfinance and applied the same for producing crops. It finds that a significant relationship exists between microfinance and crop production. Farmers who have access to microcredit reported higher crop production than their counterparts who did not. The paper states that increase in microcredit to the farmers would increase crop production by more than one-third. It covers the following sections in detail:

• Literature review with a focus on concept and evolution of microfinance;
• Models of microfinance including the Grameen Bank model, village bank model, credit unions, self-help groups, cooperative model, and other models within the Ghanaian financial industry;
• Microfinance and agricultural production with a focus on microfinance’s contribution to agricultural finance in Ghana;
• Methodology of the study including data collection and model specification;
• Analysis of results and a discussion on findings.