Finance Ministry awards Le205m research grants to 26 students

Business

The Ministry of Finance has last Friday presented cheques worth Le205 million to 26 deserving economics students from three universities and others studying overseas for Thesis facilitation.

The funds according to the Ministry’s Director of Research and Delivery Division Dr. Yakama Manty Jones, were provided by the African Development Bank (AfDB) to support the ministry’s research drive.

According to her, the support will help the students’ research capacity as they go along with their dissertations/theses on economics. The grants were given to 17 BSC students, 6 MSC students and 3 PhD candidates.

The research themes of the candidates are; for Bachelor candidates they will be inquiring into Taxation and Fiscal Policy, Inflation and Money Demand, Employment, education and Aviation and Savings and Micro-Finance.

The Masters candidates will study, Monetary Policy, Agriculture and Fisheries, Aid and Growth and Fiscal Decentralization. And for the Doctoral Candidates they will work on Small and Medium Enterprises, Mining and Development, Economic Growth and Treasury Single Account.

Dr Jones explained that the total grant provided by the AfDB is US$750,000 and the said financing is to serve the purpose of enhancing policy development and implementation through research and capacity building.

Chief Economist Alimamy Bangura said they received several proposals from students, and these proposals were reviewed and candidates that scored above 50 percent were shortlisted. The successful candidates that were shortlisted came from the Fourah Bay College, Njala University, EBK University, and students studying overseas.

The Review Committee were made up of staff of the Ministry of Finance, Bank of Sierra Leone, Statistics Sierra Leone, Lecturers from the University of Sierra Leone, Njala University, University of Makeni, and the Institute of Public Administration and Management.

The BSC students will receive Le5 million, Masters Students Le10 million each and the Doctorate candidates Le20 million each respectively and Le30 million for students studying overseas.

Mathew Dingie, Principal Deputy Financial Secretary during the symbolic handing over of cheques congratulated the winners and encouraged them to embark on research that will contribute to policy development.

“Your research should able to attract grants from our development partners. Only research can help us to develop the right policies that are workable in Sierra Leone,” he said.

The Ministry also presented certificates to STATA Trainees.

By Zainab Iyamide Joaque. zainabIjoaque@awokonewspaper.sl

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