The three Northern Regions are to benefit from a 15.23 million dollar Sustainable Land and Water Management Project (SLWMP) aimed at reducing land degradation and to enhance maintenance of biodiversity.

The Global Environmental Facility is contributing a grant of 8.15 dollar through the World Bank while the Government of Ghana would contribute 7.8 million dollars for the implementation of the five year
project. 

He said the project also sought to strengthen spatial planning for the identification of linked watershed investments in the savannah areas of the country.

The increasing phenomena of land degradation, he said, was a major developmental issue, adding that “Our ecosystem which have land and water as the base are rapidly losing their resilience and their
capacity to generate goods and services for our socio-economic development”. 

Mr. Amlalo also announced that Ghana has finalised its Strategic Investment Framework (SIF) to help prioritise certain areas that need immediate attention for protection from degradation.

The SIF is a framework developed to guide the formulation and implementation of all land management projects and programmes in Ghana to ensure efficient management of financial and technical resources
and to achieve a synergy of efforts from 2011 to 2025.   

He said it was an investment framework to support the implementation of the national action programme to combat desertification and drought in a coordinated fashion.

Mr. Amlalo said issues bordering on the environment especially land resources were of paramount importance to the country as a greater number of the people depend on land resources through
agriculture, animal rearing and fishing for their livelihood.

Mr. Isaac Acquah, Principal Programme Officer of the EPA, explained that the project which would be in three phases would help improve the livelihood of farmers and communities by promoting sustainable land management technologies, and innovative policy and increase agricultural productivity while generating ecosystem services.  

He said the first component of the project would be capacity building for integrated spatial planning and providing integrated spatial planning tools to strengthen the capacity of Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) and relevant implementing agencies to guide and undertake decision-making for investment across the northern savannah region.    

The second component, Mr. Acquah said, was water and land management which would fund technical assistance, equipment, incremental operating costs, and direct incentives to support community flood and land management at the micro-watershed level.

Source: GNA

Bookmark with: