NGO restoring degraded Asubima Forest Reserve

Accra, Oct. 27, GNA - Afrika Wiederaufforstungsverein e.V (Ed. Correct), an international non-governmental organisation and its Ghanaian counterpart; Africa Reafforestation Union (AWV) are restoring 7,863 hectares of totally degraded at Asubima Forest Reserve in the Brong Ahafo Region.

The 13 communities in the project areas have been provided with wells and trained to start tree nurseries to assist them to replenish the reserve and start sustainable farming practices.

Mr Michael Yao Tomfeah, Chairman of AWV, who spoke to the Ghana News Agency, in an interview in Accra, said the organisation was collaborating with the Forestry Department to encourage the beneficiary communities to adopt the Taungya system - planting of trees and food crops on the same piece of land.

He said making fuel wood available to the people was the sure means of checking environmental degradation through the cutting of trees for energy.

AWV has also provided a truck for the transportation of the seedlings and cash crops, while five dams are to be constructed to facilitate the harvesting of rainwater

Mr Tomfeah said the dams would be provided with hunting stands to enable hunters to do selective hunting of animals. He said the first phase of the project, which started in 2002 and ended 2004, had been replaced with a second phase, which would last for three years.

AWU he said aimed at assisting the youth to stop shifting cultivation and rather combine farming activities with agro-forestry. He said the German Ambassador, Mr Peter Linder visited the project site, where he asked the people to refrain from the setting of bushfires to avoid the destruction of the tree seedlings.

Mr Emmanuel K. Mensah, an official with AWU, said the organisation had projects in the Brong Ahafo, Volta, Northern, Eastern and Central Regions.

He said a new project would start at Ada in the Greater Accra Region.