MESTI partners FAO to manage wetland resources
The Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation (MESTI) has signed a Technical Cooperation Project (TCP) agreement with the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) to sustainably manage and enhance the country’s wetlands.
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The two-year project, which is expected to cost about US$390,000, will address issues militating against lagoons through a holistic approach, with the overall goal of enhancing the management of these resources.
It is also to promote livelihood options and resilience of wetland communities at Keta and Ada in the Volta and Greater Accra regions respectively.
The Minister for Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, Professor Kwabena Frimpong Boateng, said his outfit had been working with the FAO over the years to ensure the sustainable management of wetland resources, and thanked the organisation for accepting to maintain its partnership in this area.
He said the project was of outmost importance to both the government and the various communities owing to their socio-economic and cultural benefits and called for stakeholder support to jointly manage lagoon resources for food, nutrition, security and resilient livelihoods.
FAO’s commitment
The FAO Regional Programme Leader for Africa and Representative to Ghana, Dr Abebe Haile-Gabriel, commended the government for recognising the importance of wetlands in its policy document and the need to preserve its biological diversity and cultural attributes for present and future generations.
He mentioned that the FAO had supported the MESTI some few years ago to assess issues affecting major lagoons in Ghana with respect to the forestry and fishery resources status and use, human activities, institutional responsibilities and management practices.
He said that assessment helped to identify certain gaps and challenges associated with sustainable management of these resources, some of which included communal and individual pressures through over-exploitation, drainage, conversion, pollution among others which continuously threatened the environmental sustainability of lagoons.
Dr Abebe Haile also pointed out that the poor knowledge and perception of the ecological and socio-cultural values of lagoons and their associated watersheds had made the protection and management the preserve of a relatively few institutions and individuals.
According to him, wetlands were of immense socio-economic importance to communities in their proximity and to the wider society at large because of the pertinent natural functions they performed, as well as the natural products they generated, while maintaining and preserving biological diversity, as well as cultural attributes.
He said indigenous populations had traditionally benefited from the wetland ecosystem as a source of basic necessities of life ranging from building materials, hunting, crop production and fishing, as well as a source of water.
He,therefore, pledged the FAO’s commitment in terms of supporting government’s efforts in identifying and integrating climate adaptation measures for the agriculture sector into relevant national planning and budgeting processes.