Professor of Development Economics at the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) at the University of Ghana, Legon, Professor Ernest Ayeetey, says Ghana has expanded access to education without creating enough jobs to absorb the growing number of graduates.
He says the imbalance between the increasing number of people passing through schools and the limited employment opportunities available to them is undermining the objectives of the country’s education reforms.
Speaking at the Achimota Speaks event on Wednesday, November 11, Prof Ayeetey said the establishment of schools such as Achimota was intended to produce skilled professionals, including engineers, agriculturists, pharmacists, doctors and administrators, to meet the needs of the economy.
However, he argued that successive education reforms have increased the number of people enrolled in schools without a corresponding expansion in the sectors where they are expected to work.
“We have increased the number of schools through our reforms. We have increased the number of people who go through, get enrolled in our schools. And we haven’t increased the number of places where they can work,” he said.
Prof Ayeetey explained that the manufacturing sector had remained stagnant, leaving engineering graduates with limited opportunities to apply their training.
“Manufacturing throughout this period has remained stagnant. There are no new factories coming up. Why are the engineers going to work? If you go to university and you get a degree in electrical engineering or mechanical engineering, whatever, why are you going to work? There are no factories,” he said.
He also questioned the opportunities available to graduates trained in agriculture, noting that the limited number of modern farms made it difficult for them to practise what they had learnt.
“They do all these things and yet the number of farms that are supposed to be modernising, they are not there. So, even if you send them to Kwadaso to go and learn how to do various things, including extension, they are not having any places to go and practise what they’ve learnt,” he added.
According to him, the situation weakens the incentive to invest in education reforms when students struggle to secure university places, and graduates spend years searching for employment.
“If you are the headmaster of Achimota School and people come to your school, they perform decently, can’t go to university, and those who go to university after three, four years of getting a degree, spend another three, four years looking for a job, what incentive is there to pursue all of these reforms?” he asked.
Prof Ayeetey said discussions about improving education must therefore extend beyond expanding schools and increasing enrolment to addressing the state of the economy and its capacity to create jobs for graduates.