ECONOMICS AND ITS DETERMINANT ON THE DORMINANCE OF A NATION

I grew up in a community that always watched and listened to Economist and Political Leaders explaining how good the economy has being in their tenure of office. To most of these leaders they come up with some numbers that most of their listeners' knew nothing about. They talked about Gross Domestic Product (GDP), Gross National Product (GNP) and all those economic terms.

As if this was not enough the national television station always had a segment dedicated to presenting these increase and decrease in stock prices of various equities, commodity prices and other foreign currencies; with no opportunity to explain what those actually meant. It was not until my second year in High School that one of our Economic tutors took time to explain what all those meant and how it can impact the world around us. I got to learn about how the GDP of a country can indicate the level of economic growth the nation is moving to and also how their dominance on the world market can be.

A look at the Great Eight (G-8) economies of the world tells it all. These countries are made up of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the Unites Kingdom and the United States. These countries are dominated countries with the largest economic growth over several decades of concentrating on using resources to build their economies. These so called G8 countries meet regularly to draw and plan economic policies for the world. How can this be possible if they don't have great dominance on the world economy? The G8 alone dominate nearly 50% of the total votes in the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. They also have great influence in the World Trade Organization and the Security Council of the United Nations. These are all dominant organizations in the world and the G8 alone having such dominance proves how much power they exert on the world's economy.

The world economic meltdown saw many giant economies like the United States of America, Unites Kingdom, Russia and other countries in Europe taking a bad hit to their economies. This led to various job losses, shutdown of factories and high standard of living due to continuous increase in taxes in these various economies. Then came the European Union Bailout Policy to help their member states combat the harsh economic difficulties facing them, and it all came with a string attached. All these harsh economic conditions shifted the power and dominance of the so called big European economies to emerging countries like Brazil and India.

However , despite all the difficult economic downturn in various economies back in Africa an economy like Ghana back in 2004 to 2008 was experiencing some form of relieve in their economies after the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) under the auspices of International Monetary Fund and the World Bank provided debt reliefs aside other funds to develop their economies. Aside these funds allocated to countries like Ghana, to have dominance over the world takes some form of a game plan to drive towards that goal. Japan adopted the policy of producing the best quality products at affordable cost and continuous improvement in their level of technology. This has resulted in their nation being in the driving seat of the world's technology. Even children of school going age can come up with an invention that blows the mind.

The power house of Asia, China also adopted the policy of producing at the lowest possible cost through cheap labor. This goes a long way to reduce the unit cost of production thereby affecting the selling price of their products in the world market. Then North Korea with its nuclear energy programme which is much opposed by most world leaders especially the United States due to security concerns. Despite these challenges North Korea will be able to fuel the Asian economy if they are able to convince the world that their nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes.

The Arab nation of United Arab Emirates decades ago had a leader that was able to use its black diamond to develop their country into what it is today. Now they can boost of some of the world's best architecture structures that attracts visitors all over the world. One cannot fail to mention of their economy when discussing about the Arabs.

A look back into South America is the rising of Brazil with its ethanol from sugar cane. Who would have ever thought that a country growing sugar cane will one day become an economic giant? But now it is more than possible. It appears that, the aftermath of the Economic Meltdown in 2008 has indeed shaken up most economies.

Now as a catalyst for these economic shake downs most educational institutions are coming up with courses in Development Studies in all sectors that fuel the economy of a country so as to train minds that will be able to solve this economic canker faced by most countries. They even go to the extent of offering full tuition waivers with living expenses to train minds that will be able to take up the mantle of keeping the economy in control.

'Parallel to this economic shift, and the dramatic addition to educational goals, is an appreciation that the brain is an open and dynamic learning system. We now, in effect, have it in our power to design learning systems that are in line with not just the needs of the economy, but also the natural functioning of the brain. It is truly an exciting time to be alive, but as is the case in all revolutionary times there is a dark side lurking in the shadows - a society of gargantuan'