TAKE STEPS TO CURB BUSH FIRE MENACE - SAYS PARLIAMENTARY SELECT C'TEE (DG, SEPT 22, 2011, PAGE 13)

THE Parliamentary Select Committee on Lands and Forestry has implored cabinet and the country’s environmental institutions to team up and take pragmatic action to address the menace of bush fires. After touring forest plantations in the Northern Region, it came to light that bush fires and cattle grazing were the biggest threats to the country’s reforestation drives, particularly in the north. Each year, the nation looks on helplessly as fires ravage farms and forest plantations, thereby bringing the toils of farmers and those who planted the trees to naught. Hon Albert Abongo, who is the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bongo and chairman of the committee, said it was high time the nation’s leaders make the initiative to bring this annual human-induced disaster to a halt. “The dry season is around the corner and it would be regrettable if once again we sit and watch unconcerned us some unscrupulous individuals burn the food crops and trees which were raised with huge investments,” he stated. The committee inspected the status of work at various project sites for the National Forest Plantation Development Programme in the Central Gonja, West Gonja, Yendi and Nanumba North districts. Among the forest reserves it inspected was the Yakombo Forest Reserve, near Buipe, which occupies an estimated land area of 1,160km² and is considered the largest forest reserve in Ghana. The MPs expressed satisfaction over the execution of the plantation programme and entreated the Forestry Services Department (FSD) to ensure the proper and sustained management of the plantations to guarantee their survival. They however raised concerns over the delayed payment of field employees and charged the FSD and its implementing partners to fast-track the payment process so as not to jeopardise the execution of the project. The Northern Regional Forestry Manager, Mr Ebenezer Dzaney Djagbletey, who took the MPs round the various sites, said the Northern Region had exceeded its targets for the plantation programme. “A total area of 3,309 hectares had been planted by the end of December, 2010, which is far higher than the 2000 hectares target that had been set,” he told the committee. He said in Yendi, a total area of 1,126 hectares was planted in off-reserve areas, whiles 200 hectares of area was planted in existing forest reserves. In Tamale, a total area of 462 hectares had been planted in off-reserve areas, whiles 70 hectares of areas located within forest reserves had been planted. In Walewale, Damongo, Buipe and Bole, Mr Djagbletey mentioned that between 200 and 406 hectares of off-reserve areas had been planted in each area. The Forestry Manager further noted that not only had the plantation programme restored helped to conserve and protect the environment, but also created a number of employment avenues. He said in Yendi alone, many energetic youth had been engaged to fill over 2000 job opportunities, whiles in Tamale, Damongo, Buipe and Walewale, between 500 and 820 job hands had been engaged in each area. Mr Djagbletey said in spite of the progress, the programme was facing some challenges, such as the delayed payment of field staff, the lack of logistics to facilitate field work and the limited supply of protective clothing.