Stakeholders call on Ghanaians to conserve the environment

Accra, April 28, GNA - Stakeholders in the Tourism Industry on Tuesday called on Ghanaians to rise up and support efforts at conserving and restoring back the environment that had so much been degraded through various human activities.

They said society had done so much damage to the environment which is having a rippling effect on all sectors of our lives, particularly, on tourism.

The stakeholders said the situation is also compounded by the lack of enforcing environmental laws as well as implementing various policies that tend to protect the environment.

Speaking at a Ghana Tourism Federation (GHATOF) advocacy forum in Accra, the stakeholders said as a country; 'we need a lot of discipline, planning and commitment to help restore the environment'.

The stakeholders include Ghana Real Estate Development Association (GREDA), Town and Country Planning, Parks and Gardens, Environmental Protection Agency, Ghana Tourism Authority, ministries, department and agencies and traditional rulers.

The Advocacy for the Development of Green Infrastructure Policy for Ghana forum is being championed by GHATOF with the aim to promote national resilience to climate change and its socio-economic ramification through the development of a robust and sustainable green infrastructure.

The stakeholders also called on the authorities to use the national sanitation platform to educate the people about the need to keep the environment safe by helping green the environment.

Mr David Nana Anim, President of GHATOF said the forum was to create awareness on the impact of climate change on the tourism industry as well as look at the role of how to maximize the benefits plants provide to urban environments.

He said the absence of a national Green Infrastructure Development policy has facilitated the desecration of the natural vegetation, especially in urban areas.

He said the problem has been compounded by weak state institutions responsible for the maintenance of parks, gardens and open spaces, which have denied the nation of the immense economic and ecological benefits that could be derived if a structured and comprehensive national attention is paid to the development of a green infrastructure.

Mr Anim said GHATOF thus, intend to embark on the advocacy to ensure that all existing national environmental policies are merged into one, and are made into a law that would be enforced by the right authorities and institutions to help address issues of the degraded environment.

'We want to advocate greening in our homes, and we want the law to ensure that people are obligated to plant trees in their homes, while we stop the cutting down of tress, especially in forest and national reserves line Aburi Garden,' he said.

Contributing to the discussion, Mr Sammy Amegayibor, Executive Secretary of GREDA said there is the need for town and country planners to move in to check the operations of registered companies and other real estate developers who deal in the sale of lands to ensure that they abide by the plans of the State in demarcating lands for customers so that they would conform to plans of the authority.

Mr Samuel Atta Mills, Chief Executive Officer of Ghana Tourist Development Company Limited, who chaired the function, said there are enough laws in Ghana that needs to be implemented to ensure a much safer environment.

'All we need is discipline and commitment to ensure that we all do the right thing to save our environment,' Mr Atta Mills said.

Mrs Susanna Boakye, President and Chief Executive Officer of HR Solutions Africa, in a presentation, said as part of the advocacy, a national strategy on greening would have to be developed to ensure that everybody embraces it and work with it.

GNA