Prof. Wisdom Akpalu attended Anloga Secondary School for his Ordinary Level Certificate and Presbyterian Boys Secondary Schools, Legon, for his Advanced Level Certificate. He then proceeded to University of Cape Coast (UCC) where he graduated with a BA (Hons) Economics degree and a Diploma in Education. He was retained as a Teaching Assistant and awarded a scholarship by the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC) for an MSc Economics degree at Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. The program was taught by the Center for the Study of African Economies (CSAE) at Oxford University. Upon graduation, he was hired by UCC as a lecturer. After teaching for 4 years, he becomes one of 5 candidates selected globally in 2001 to benefit from the prestigious Swedish Sida scholarship for a PhD degree in Economics at University of Gothenburg, Sweden. He successfully completed the program and obtained a PhD as well as Licentiate of Philosophy degrees in Economics. The Center for Environmental Economics and Policy in Africa (CEEPA) in Pretoria, South Africa hired him as a research fellow soon after he graduated. He left for the USA a year later and was hired by the State University of New York (SUNY) – Farmingdale, New York, where he was promoted to Associate Professor of Economics in 2012 and was the Chair of the Department of Economics. While at SUNY, Prof. Akpalu was offered an opportunity by United Nations University (UNU) to return to Ghana and manage a PhD program in Development Economics at the University of Ghana. The program currently has over 30 students and has graduated 3 of them.
Prof. Akpalu is a gifted teacher and internationally recognized scholar in the field of environment and natural resource economics, and social economics. He has taught, supervised, and examined several undergraduate and graduate students globally. Since 2013, he was invited by the AERC and CEEPA as a resource person to mentor researchers on the continent. Regarding research, Prof. Akpalu has published several articles in reputable journals and has presented his works at major international conferences. The North American Association of Fisheries Economists (NAAFE) invited him as a keynote speaker at the 2019 forum in Canada. In 2015, the Academy of Economics and Finance (AEF) recognized his extraordinary achievements in research and awarded him the Research Fellow of the year. Moreover, Prof. Akpalu has consulted for many international organizations including the World Bank, the African Development Bank, Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad), International Labor Organization (ILO), The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), etc. He is the current president of the African Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (AFAERE).