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PurposeThis paper aims to analyze the effects of crop specialization on agricultural productivity and commercialization for farmers who produce high-value crops in the Northern Savannah Ecological Zone of Ghana.Design/methodology/approachThe study used the USAID/Ghana Feed the Future (FTF) survey, which collected data on high-value crops (i.e. maize, rice and soya). Data for the analysis consists of 2,903 farm households. The study utilized the three-stage generalized method of moment estimation technique to deal with the potential endogeneity of crop specialization within the context of productivity and commercialization and heteroscedasticity issues in the data.FindingsThe study found that crop specialization positively relates to agricultural productivity and commercialization, suggesting that increased crop specialization in the production of high-value stimulates productivity and opens market opportunities for farm households. These findings imply that crop specialization seems more beneficial to farmers as it significantly improves productivity and commercialization.Research limitations/implicationsThe study was conducted in the Northern Savannah Ecological Zone of Ghana and not the entire country.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first to have jointly modeled crop specialization, agricultural productivity and commercialization. The main advantage of using this system approach is that it uses more information, thereby providing more precise parameter estimates.

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Purpose Following the reforms in monetary policy and shift in fiscal policies, it is logical to presume that these reforms may cause a significant structural change in the dynamic processes of inflation and hence affect the nature of inflation persistence. The purpose of this paper is to examine the persistence nature of the different inflation episodes while controlling for the effects of demand- and supply-side factors, which are modeled as regime-dependent. Design/methodology/approach This paper used the Markov-switching dynamic regression and annual time series data. Findings The results showed that high inflation regime is more persistent than low inflation regime, with a respective average duration of an escape of 3.5 and 2.57 years, which suggests that price stability achievements are less sustainable. In both regimes, demand- and supply-side factors play significant roles in driving inflation, but the effect of the latter dominates. Thus, on the argument of whether inflation in Ghana is structural or monetary, the results support the former. The roles of both structural and monetary factors have changed over time, but that of the former has been more significant and important in Ghana. Originality/value This study provides the first empirical attempt, in the case of Ghana, that examines the persistence nature of different inflation regimes, while modeling the effects of supply and demand factors as regime dependent. In the modeling sense, the authors also contribute by ruling out the assumption that the researcher knows the processes responsible for each observation at each point in time.