Trade Liberalization Policies, Production and Poverty Reduction

The study assesses the effects of Agricultural trade liberalization policies on production and poverty reduction among rural smallholder crop farmers in Ghana. Both cross-sectional and secondary data were used in the study. Three hundred (300) respondents were sampled from six (6) districts across the six agro-ecological zones in the country using the simple random sampling technique across the study districts and structured questionnaire was administered to them. Data analysis involved the use of multiple regression analysis and logistic regression to determine the influence of agricultural trade policy variables on the production of (cocoa, maize and rice) and also the influence of agricultural trade policy variables in enhancing or increasing production of the crops under consideration respectively. Descriptive statistics was also employed to summarize the data.The study concluded that Agricultural trade liberalization policies adopted by Ghana in the early 1980s generally have had comparatively much negative effects on the productions of maize and rice than on cocoa.