Women Urged To Protect The Environment

Abokobi (Greater Accra). 23, Sept. A week-long workshop to mobilise, educate and empower women from eight African countries kicked off at Abokobi today with an appeal to the participants to take action to protect the environment. The workshop, organized by the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA), Ghana, and sponsored by the World YWCA has the theme: Waste recycling and Tree planting. The participants are from Ghana, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Cameroun, Togo and the Gambia. Ms Alice Adarkwa-Dadzie, Deputy Director of the Environmental Protection Agency, said the exploitation of the environment to satisfy human needs has ''led to serious abuses with their negative impact on human health and well-being''. She mentioned industrial, mining, marine and domestic activities as some of the major factors of environmental degradation in Ghana. Ms Adarkwa-Dadzie blamed the country's environmental problems on high population growth and its associated demand for natural resources. ''This phenomenon has led to wholesale cutting and burning of tropical rain forest....and indiscriminate waste disposal'', she said. She said the lack of comprehensive laws on the conservation of the environment is the ''reason for the increasing vegetative degradation''.