Changes in land cover (LC) can lead to environmental challenges, but few studies have investigated LC changes at a country wide scale in Ghana. Tracking LC changes at such a scale overtime is relevant for devising solutions to emerging issues. This study examined LC changes in Ghana for the past almost two and half decades covering 1995–2019 to highlight significant changes and opportunities for sustainable development. The study used land cover data for six selected years (1995, 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2019) obtained from the European Space Agency. The data was analyzed using R, ArcGIS Pro and Microsoft Excel 365 ProPlus. The original data was reclassified into eight LC categories, namely: agriculture, bare area, built-up, forest, grassland, other vegetation, waterbody, and wetland. On average, the results revealed 0.7%, 131.7%, 23.3%, 46.9%, and 11.2% increases for agriculture, built-up, forest, waterbody, and wetland, respectively, across the nation. However, losses were observed for bare area (92.8%), grassland (51.1%), and other vegetation (41%) LCs overall. Notably, agricultural land use increased up to 2015 and decreased subsequently but this did not affect production of the major staple foods. These findings reveal the importance of LC monitoring and the need for strategic efforts to address the causes of undesirable change.

Scholars of natural resource governance argue that national and local governments must engage ordinary community members. When ordinary community members access information about the utilization of natural resource revenue and get an opportunity to provide feedback, the revenue management improves. In this article, the authors engaged Ghanaians through a spatial crowdsourcing platform for their opinion about petroleum management revenue in Ghana. The participants accessed the platform via their mobile phones and completed a survey on their opinions about petroleum revenue management, the Free Senior High School program, and their priority areas for petroleum revenue funding in Ghana. The results suggest that ordinary community members, and particularly women, seemed less informed about the management of petroleum revenue in Ghana. Furthermore, Ghanaians’ opinions regarding their prioritized projects for petroleum revenue funding vary geographically. The authors conclude that decision-makers can use spatial crowdsourcing to engage ordinary community members in natural resource revenue management.

It has been over a decade of petroleum revenue utilisation in Ghana. Yet, there is a dearth of research on Ghanaians’ sentiments on petroleum revenue management in Ghana. However, research indicates that investigating citizens’ sentiments and addressing their grievances could prevent conflicts and promote better revenue utilisation in natural resource-rich countries. So, this study investigated Ghanaians’ sentiments about petroleum revenue management and its contribution to the Free Senior High School (SHS) programme in Ghana through an online survey. The study employed the quantitative approach in which the data was gathered through an online survey questionnaire and analysed using natural language processing techniques. The results show that the participants had negative sentiments about petroleum revenue management and the Free SHS programme in Ghana. However, they trust the managers and anticipate better revenue management in the future. The study recommends that the government should consult broadly with all stakeholders regarding petroleum revenue management to avoid potential conflicts. The article concludes that petroleum revenue managers can combine spatial crowdsourcing and natural language processing to extract citizens’ opinions at specific locations for better revenue management.