Sustainability of donor funded projects in Volta region under test

Ho, Jan. 29, GNA - Two landmark donor funded projects in the Volta region, the USAID funded Government Accountability Improve Trust (GAIT II- 2004-2007), and the German Funded Forest Protection and Resource Use Management Project (FORUM-1993-2008) have ended, sparking debates about their sustainability. GAIT II focused on supporting democratic local government and decentralization, strengthening civil society and increasing community advocacy for quality education.

Mr Robert Hellyer, USAID/Ghana Mission Director GAIT II Programme, addressing a ceremony to handover the project to the Ho Municipal Assembly last Wednesday, said the challenge now was to sustain the gains achieved.

"The true success of GAIT II will be measured by whether the high level of local government-citizen interaction that began under it will continue after the project ends". Answering questions regarding the sustenance of the gains of GAIT II, Mrs Evelyn Arthur, Chief of Party, in charge of the project, emphasized the need for continued support to Civic Unions to able them to engage the Municipal Assembly for accountability. She said the Ho Municipal Assembly had much to show for the successes of GAIT II.

Mrs Arthur said the project only sowed the seeds for effective people's participation in local government and that it was up to all stakeholders to nurture the gains and build on them for possible replication in other parts of the region and the country. She called for effective use of the trained internal resource persons at both the Community and the Municipal Assembly levels towards the sustenance and replication of the project

The FORUM Project, on the other hand, led to the rehabilitation of 14,212 hectares of degraded forests and the establishment of 5,907 hectares of wood-lots, developed alternative livelihoods for communities in the project, raised the capacities of the local communities in forest management and protection and helped personnel of the Forest Services Division to acquire new techniques.

It also provided employment to about 3,000 local people and raised their incomes and standard of living.

But like the GAIT II project, the desires for the sustainability of the project were expressed at the ceremonial handing over in Ho on Friday ahead of the February 2008 deadline. Indications were that the first fall out from the withdrawal of the Germans would be the joblessness of 3,000 local people who for the period that the project lasted were gainfully employed and enjoyed stable incomes.

Nana Asamoah Nyarko, President of the Volta Regional Association of Community Forest Management Committees (VORAFMAC) observed that, "this is one project that with sustainability in mind (unlike similar regional projects of the past) put structures in place and going a step further to empower stakeholders to continue from where they are leaving off. "What is left is for us to do our collective best to maintain the good work this project has done for the Volta Region and to protect the forest for generations of today and tomorrow", he advised. Professor Nii Ashie Kotey, Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Commission, held that "FORUM may be closing in a certain sense but the ideas, methods and lessons are certainly not closing". "We owe it as a collective responsibility that the ideas, concepts bring even more benefits to the region (Volta) and the country, he added."