Educational Media Reviews Online

As many developing nations, such as Ghana, strive to modernize and pay off foreign debt, the only way to inject money into their economy is through exportation. As one Ghanaian states in this documentary, Ghana needs to “trade its way out of poverty.” This film thoroughly discusses the impact of globalization on the people and policy-makers of Ghana.

The film takes the viewer to several facilities to demonstrate the extent to which global markets have affected Ghana. A fully stocked granary remains idle because domestic poultry farms can buy cheaper US-grown maize. When the poultry farm workers were interviewed, they reported that they must buy the cheaper maize in order to compete in the European poultry market. A banana plantation may only sell bananas which meet the European Union length requirement. In order to grow their bananas to meet this requirement, Ghana’s banana growers must use expensive fertilizers, which drive up the cost of production.

This is a simply outstanding documentary. The film successfully makes the leaps between the impacts of globalization on the worker to the rationale of the policy makers, by interviewing a good representation of both groups. In addition to Ghanaian authorities, the documentary contains interviews with stakeholders, scholars, and the President of the World Bank.

This is an excellent film with sensible movement of information from identification and examination of the problems to problem-solving approaches. The film gives a fairly optimistic appraisal of Ghana’s ingenuity in facing the binding factors affecting their exportation. A group of fish-harvesting women have formed a cooperative unit to buy fish-smoking equipment. One Ghanaian spokesperson stated that Ghana seeks to form alliances with the primary consumers of their products to apply pressure on the European Union to relax trade quotas and other restrictions.

The Trade Trap receives the highest recommendation for anyone aged high school and over. This documentary gives an extremely well focused analysis of Ghana’s response to the demands of the global economy.