Provide more cover for informants

State institutions have been urged to provide adequate cover for people in forest-periphery communities who expose the activities of illegal chainsaw operators and loggers by protecting their identities.

This comes amid growing reports of intimidation and threats of revenge by the offenders in the aftermath of their arrest and release by the law enforcement agencies.

Participants at a training workshop on the Voluntary Partnership Agreement (VPA), signed between Ghana and the European Union (EU), discussed instances where the cover of informers had been blown, thus putting their lives and that of their families at risk.

This has led to a situation where many in the local communities are afraid to give out people engaged in illegal timber operations.

The programme was organized by the “Friends of the Earth," a non-governmental organization (NGO), and brought together farmers, loggers, processors and millers.

It formed part of measures to deepen the understanding and build the capacity of civil society, the informal and the private informal sector, to improve the nation’s forest governance, reduce illegal timber harvesting, and corrupt practices in the forest sector.

Contributors to discussions at the workshop said it would be difficult to get anybody to volunteer information, when they could not be assured of their safety by the appropriate authorities.

Mr James Parker of the Tropenbos International-Ghana urged NGOs to let their voices be heard on issues relating to the protection and sustainable management of the nation’s forest and its resources.

They needed to forge a strong front in support of efforts at enforcing the forest laws, he said.