in Agriculture. Dr. Kwakye Ameyaw, Technical Advisor to Chief Executive of Forestry Commission, (FC) asked members in forest fringe communities to lead the fight against deforestation in the country’s forest reserves since it contributed to climate change and impacted negatively on cocoa production. A century ago, Ghana's tropical hardwood forest extended from about the middle of the country southward to the sea. Not only cocoa from the forest, the project also further was able to segregate agroforestry cocoa from monoculture cocoa. The Green Climate Fund (GCF) has approved a project worth $54.5 million to address the alarming deforestation and forest degradation challenges in the Northern Savannah Zone of Ghana… Dr. Augustus Asamoah, Principal Project Manager of Proforest speaking at the workshop, said Ghana was taking steps to address deforestation and its impact on cocoa production in cocoa producing areas through the Ghana cocoa forest REDD Program (GCFRP). He continued that continuing the project is very important to produce a national monitoring system to monitor and address the deforestation in the forest areas. The workshop was jointly organized by Proforest, Forestry Commission, COCOBOD and World Cocoa Foundation, to provide a platform for the stakeholders to work together towards the development of a management and investment plan to address deforestation, low cocoa production, protection of forest reserves and promote climate smart agricultural activities in the area. The team has now benefited from upgraded skills training to execute this task. “In the past from going round, some of the cocoa could stay long at hundred years but now it has come down to ten to fifteen year and because the cocoa farms doesn’t stay long the farmers turn to look for new areas to crop. So the purpose of this project is to tease out this and find a way of halting the encroachment in the forest reserves which is as a result of cocoa farming. 75% tree cover reflects a dense canopy. These forests and their trees keep the soil fertile and with so much of deforestation, the soil corrosions probabilities also increase manifold. In 2019, the two countries banded together to set standard prices for cocoa at a minimum of $2,600 per ton with an additional “living income” of $400 per ton for farmers. He said community members, especially farmers, had a critical role to play in fighting illegal operators in forest reserves by reporting them to the Commission for their arrest and prosecution. of Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana. The Forestry Commission has as its main mandate to manage the forestry resources in Ghana. Ghana’s last remaining tracts of primary forest can only be found within areas granted official protection. In the long term, we are expecting that we will produce cocoa without compromising the integrity of our forest resources. Send your news stories to The reason Laos made it to this list if the excessive logging in the country which is existing since 1980s. The cocoa farmers are complaining the gestation period of cocoa has reduced drastically in other words; that cocoa doesn’t take long, within ten to fifteen years and they die. So with this, the country is able to tell in the coming years whether cocoa is eating into forested areas or not. Professor Acheampong added that this project holds the potential to mitigate the impact of climate change on the environment. At least at the rate at which the climate is changing, the project can slow it.”. The forestry commission is expected to continue with the project after it ends. GIS/ Mapping Officer and Technical Assistant for Forest 2020 Project RMSC-Forestry Commission, Prince Boama, led the team to explain the map to community members. They met with community leaders, opinion leaders, assembly members and residents of communities in these communities and displayed the map to them. He said FC was working closely with all key stakeholders to address challenges in the sector to sustain the country’s forest. Led by Ecometrica, Forests 2020 brings together some of the UK’s leading experts on forest monitoring with local experts in Indonesia, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Belize, Ghana and Kenya to deliver accurate, up-to-date deforestation data generated from satellites to … The recent FAO 2010 report has estimated Ghana’s deforestation at 135 395 ha per year. Deforestation In Ghana’s Shea Landscape To Be Reduced With $54.5m. Though we hear the forest is being depleted, we now understand how serious it is after this exercise,” Chief of Ntonsue, revealed, “We will however plead that you continue updating us so that those who come before us will understand the situation as well.”, Another chief, Nana Kwadwo Adjei, Chief of Wansampo in the Sefwi Akontommira district of the Western North Region, said, “We are grateful for this Map they have shown us and the education they have given us. user = "newswires"; A rise in deforestation, drier weather conditions and Covid-19 could wreak havoc on Amazon communities and ecosystems already under threat, experts fear. The outcome of the study showed unequivocally that deforestation rate which was assessed to be 1.3% in the closed forest in 2014, has significantly reduced to 0.9% in 2017. According to him, the situation therefore presents the need to strike a balance between increasing the yield of the crops as well as maintaining the natural environment or ecosystem. Professor Emmanuel Acheampong, Head of Department, Silviculture and Forest Management of the Faculty of Renewable Natural Resources at KNUST is project team leader. The information will then be used in the planning resources to ensure that the forest resources are there for future generations. Ghana has begun employing earth observation technologies to monitor its forest resources to understand the extent of deforestation especially by cocoa production. “…So in that case, we are looking at a way out of getting our forest intact as well as increasing our cocoa productivity.”. Dr. Shalom D. Addo Danso, Lead Consultant of KABSTREK Consult, said unsustainable agricultural activities, especially for cocoa and food crop production had been identified as one of the most important drivers of deforestation. INPE’s deforestation alert system DETER shows that deforestation during January 2020 amounted to 284 square kilometers (110 square miles), an … It was a collaboration between UK Space Agency who are the funders, through an organization in the UK called the Ecometrica Limited. 1 Deforestation: Causes, Effects and Control Strategies Sumit Chakravarty 1, S. K. Ghosh 2, C. P. Suresh 2, A. N. Dey 1 and Gopal Shukla 3 1Department of Forestry 2Pomology & Post Harvest Technology, Faculty of Horticulture Uttar Banga Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Pundibari 3ICAR Research Complex for Eastern Region, Research Center, Plandu Ranchi India 1. Professor Acheampong explains that the expectation is for the forestry commission to take over this once the project ends and the outputs are handed to the forestry commission. Tel: +233 234-972-832 or +1-508-812-0505 Contact us: [email protected]