The Landscape Management Board (LMB), comprising seven members, acts as environmental watchdogs, overseeing activities to protect the environment and reporting malpractices to authorities.
This initiative is part of the European Union-funded Landscape and Environmental Agility Across the Nation (LEAN) project, involving organizations like World Vision Ghana, Rainforest Alliance, Ecocare Ghana, and Tropenbos Ghana.
The primary goals of the LMB include conserving biodiversity, enhancing climate resilience, and reducing emissions in transition zones, particularly in the Savannah high forest.
During the inauguration ceremony on Thursday November 8, 2023 at the forecourt of the Ghana National fire service in Damongo, Joseph Edwin Yalkabong, the LEAN project manager, emphasized the project’s focus on combating bushfires through the Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR) concept.
This model involves training lead farmers and fire volunteers to collaborate with communities in minimizing fire occurrences on farms and in the surroundings.
The EU LEAN project manager highlighted that, since the project’s inception, approximately 500 lead farmers and 500 fire volunteers have been trained across 25 districts to control bushfires.
Francis Gumah, the Northern Operations Manager of World Vision in a speech read on his behalf by Joseph Edwin Yelkabong, expressed concern about detrimental practices in the municipality.
He highlighted the threat posed by the felling of economic trees like shea for charcoal and fuel wood, jeopardizing the environmental progress achieved by World Vision and its partners.
Mr. Gumah emphasized World Vision’s extensive work in restoring 77,898 hectares of degraded lands across 445 communities in the Upper and Northern regions. Despite the LEAN project building adaptive capacity for 3246 community members, he acknowledged the ongoing challenge, especially in West Gonja, where the target was 6,000.
Affirming World Vision’s dedication, Mr. Gumah reiterated their collaboration with stakeholders to achieve sustainable development goals, including those related to child well-being and community welfare.
Hon. Musah Karim Kusubari, the Municipal Chief executive for West Gonja, praised World Vision Ghana for the LEAN project, foreseeing its positive impact on food security in the municipality.
Hon. Kusubari also emphasized the significant role farmers play in national development, particularly in the export of agricultural commodities.
The Savannah regional Commander of the Ghana National Fire service, ACFOI Emmanuel Ofori Adjei on his part explained that presently, the bushfire menace is a threat to Government intervention programs on Agriculture such as the planting for food and jobs and planting for export and rural development at whichs backdrop they are put in their efforts in collaboration with world vision Ghana to train one thousand six hundred and ninety eight fire volunteers in the past across the region and the recent one thousand fire volunteers who have been outdoored to help carry out fire education in their communities to help reduce the menace bushfires.
ACFOI Emmanuel Ofori Adjei, the Commander of the Ghana National Fire Service in the Savannah region, highlighted the current challenge of bushfires posing a threat to government agricultural initiatives like “Planting for Food and Jobs” and “Planting for Export and Rural Development.”
He disclosed that in their collaboration with World Vision Ghana, they have actively engaged in training efforts, having successfully trained 1,698 fire volunteers in the past and a recent batch of 1,000 fire volunteers being introduced to conduct fire education within their communities, aiming to mitigate the bushfire menace.
All one thousand fire volunteers were presented with certificates
Source: Padfm.com.gh/Kumatey Gorden/0243531604
