FAO launches project

to strengthen participatory approaches in forest management

Akyawkrom (Ash), Aug. 25, GNA - A project to strengthen the participatory approaches in forest management in Ghana was on Monday launched at the Wood Industries Training Centre at Akyawkrom in the Ejisu-Juaben district of Ashanti. The objectives of the project which is being piloted by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in three countries namely, Ghana, Uganda and Guyana, are to integrate stakeholders through capacity building participatory approaches with middle-level forest officials and district managers. It is also to develop interactive briefings and training materials for district managers, identify and provide international expertise to assist national efforts as well as providing technical and logistical back-ups to national co-ordinators in participatory forest management. The overall aim of the project is to strengthen the country's forest management approaches to sustain wildlife and forest resources which were vital sources of income to the country and livelihoods for most people in order to reduce poverty, especially in the rural areas. In a speech read for him, Professor Dominic Fobih, Minister of Lands and Forestry, said Ghana was committed to optimising income generation through non-consumptive utilisation of forest and wildlife resources.

He said 2.5 million dollars had been committed under the Global Environment Facility Biodiversity Component of the Natural Resources Management Programme (NRMP) to support a Community Investment Fund to provide alternative livelihood schemes for forest fringes communities. The ministry was teaming up with other ministries to enhance the eco-tourism sector, Prof Fobih said, adding that, avenues for income generating opportunities were being explored for communities to benefit fully from the biodiversity and eco-tourism schemes. Mr Kwadwo Wireko-Brobbey, a member of the Forestry Commission, said the commission was establishing customer service centres throughout the country to receive complaints as a means of improving its service delivery.

He said with the current institutional and structural reforms in the forestry sector, the commission was ushering in a golden age of sustainable forest management that satisfied all stakeholders.