Draft Water Resources Policy Bill ready

A draft Water Resources Policy Bill to effectively manage and sustain the country’s water resources has been completed for parliamentary approval.

When passed, it will ensure a coordinated and integrated management of the country’s water resources. The policy was developed by the Water Resource Commission (WRC) in collaboration with other related bodies.

Ben Ampomah, an economist with the Commission, disclosed this at a day’s workshop Accra for media personnel on the state of the nation’s water resources and the activities of the commission towards the sustainability.

He said that the draft policy has been submitted to the Minister of Works and Housing and would be sent to Parliament, hopefully, at the beginning of next year.

The draft bill, he explained, touched on specific development programmes and implementation strategies to address problems encountered in managing water resources.

“It also state the specific role related organisations would play towards instituting measures to mitigate the effects of mismanaging water resources,” he said. Ampomah indicated among other things, that the draft bill assigned the government the responsibility to promote and support scientific technological research for the development and use of appropriate technologies and practices to sustain the resources.

Additionally, he said that the role of the government was to ensure the sustainable exploitation, utilisation and management of water resources while maintaining biodiversity and the equality of the environment.

Maxwell Opoku Agyeman, a legal consultant to the WRC, in his presentation on “Regulatory framework for the management of water resources” said the commission had the responsibility of issuing permits for any activity on water bodies.

He explained that in granting permits for the use of water, the commission gave priority to applications for domestic use of the resource. Opoku Agyeman said that the commission’s objections to applications or refusal to grant permits were always based on reasonable grounds.

Kwame Odame Ababio, an engineer of the WRC observed that for the Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) programme to become successful there was the need for collaboration and coordination from all relevant bodies.