Winner - 2017 Africa Think Tank Shark Tank Competition

ILAPI won the 2017 Africa Think Tank Shark Tank competition held in South Africa.
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How Administrative Bottlenecks Push People Into Poverty - An ILAPI Documentary

Latest Report - Ending Family Poverty Report

The total dependency ratio of Ghana stands at 67.4% of the population. This denotes that the pressure on the productive population is quite high. Again, 45.6% of the population is multidimensionally poor, and 23.4% are in monetary poverty. Even though global poverty has reduced from 16% in 2010 to 10% in 2015, addressing and reducing poverty is multifaceted, such that every little action that stifles and thwarts the efforts of the very poor person to lift himself out of poverty, has a ripple effect of keeping and adding more to the poverty statistics. Laws and solutions to eradicate poverty as a priority of the state have instead ushered many more into poverty. Administrative barriers and red tape to accessing funds of deceased relatives at the banks, insurance, and pension firms affect the economic prosperity of victims (beneficiaries, Next of Kin, and nominees) due to their inability to get access to the funds. This study examined the administrative barriers militating the processes of accessing the funds of deceased relatives by beneficiaries, Next of Kin, and nominees, and to secure well-defined and harmonized structures of no barriers for those who deserve it to access the funds of the deceased breadwinner to reduce family poverty and dependency in Ghana.

Specifically, the study investigated the clear legal path and documentation needed to access the funds of the deceased to support the welfare of spouses, children, and families. It also identified bureaucratic structures and examined their impact on poverty. Again, information asymmetry between the Next of Kin and financial institutions has been evaluated to promote transparency through policy reforms. The findings revealed that the vast majority of citizens do not have a written Will and administrative barriers are pushing them into poverty. Also, the NoK stipulated that the processes to access the funds were never easy due to its bureaucratic nature. This compelled a lot of people to abandon the process at one point. The study further postulated that there should be public education on the processes involved in accessing a claim as a NoK. Also, it was recommended that standard information should be required for the NoK to process claims across all financial institutions to make the process easier to access. Again, the long administrative barriers to accessing the funds should be removed to enable all classes of individuals to access the funds of the deceased, to improve human dignity and economic prosperity. It proposes fewer regulations and more freedom to help end family poverty. It is imperative to remove economic and legal barriers that militate prosperity.

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