Rightup

How travelling within Africa is prohibitive for many Africans

2011-12-10T09:34:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Travelling within Africa can be fun - real fun. Because meeting other Africans in their own countries adds a certain flavour to one's experience of the continent, a good opportunity to share in the continent's alluring natural scenes.

It is even more exciting to taste other African meals.

The experiences can be at certain times surreal and at others awesome. But travelling within Africa is burdensome, hectic, and almost impossible for most Africans, and that in itself has contributed to a large extent to the lack of knowledge among Africans of each other's culture and general worldview .

The challenges of travelling within Africa begins with the high cost of transport fares both by air and by road. The cost of travelling to neighbouring countries is prohibitive for many Africans, sometimes more than it costs to travel to Europe or the USA.

Most average Africans cannot afford the transport costs ranging around $1000 or more.

There is also the high cost of hotels on the continent.

Then there is the visa requirements, often more stringently applied for Africans than for Europeans and Americans. Indeed, it is often easier for citizens of these continents to acquire visas to African countries than it is for Africans themselves.

For instance on the website of the South African High Commission in Ghana is a list of 40 countries exempt from requiring visas to enter that country and the only African country on the list is Botswana! Probably all other South African Development Cooperation (SADC) countries, 12 of them might be exempt as well, but there is no information on the website about that. Botswana is a member.

I started writing this piece as I waited at the Hosea Kutako International Airport in Windhoek Namibia on transit to Durban via Johannesburg on December 1, 2011.

My trip itself was eventful. It started with the application for visa at the South African High Commission in Accra. I filed my application two days to the start of the trip on December 30, 2011. That was so because I had only returned from another international assignment in Addis Ababa the previous Friday November 25, 2011, late in the afternoon and therefore, the only time I could put in my application for a visa to South Africa was Monday November 28.

The Embassy staff minced no words in telling me that I couldn't apply for a visa when my trip was only two days ahead! I overheard some applicants being told to return for their passports in two weeks! What?! I thought. How should a visa to South Africa take two weeks to process? But that's the rule!

There is however, this very intriguing story of a friend I met in Addis Ababa. He told me of his ordeal in the hands of immigration officials at the Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa. He was in Ethiopia at the invitation of a state institution. There is no Ethiopian Embassy in the European country where he lives and so he had to get his visa on arrival at the airport. But on arrival at the airport, he was detained and questioned over what he was coming to Ethiopia to do! Meanwhile, as my friend was being questioned, other visitors of another race were being waved through immigration with broad smiles.

He asked the officials why they have detained him an African and yet allowed the visitors who might be coming from Europe to go through so easily. This was what the official told him, "these are tourists and our country's economy depends on tourism."

In spite of pointing out to the officials that he was in their country at the invitation of a state institution and that they should check on the list of guests for the specific event that he had mentioned, indicating that his name was on the list, they were adamant, until one official recognised him, because of his job in the media and asked his colleagues to let him pass.

A week after this sore incident, my friend returned to Ethiopia at the invitation of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), just as myself and he was detained again. It took the intervention of an official who recognised him during his first detention to get my friend out. This is Africa, and yet Africans cannot enter each others' countries freely.

Well, back to my story with the South African High Commission in Accra. I was given the visa on Wednesday afternoon November 30, 2011 and I was able to make my trip.

But my experience at the High Commission was no different from what I would have gone through seeking a visa to a European country. Interestingly however, my experience at the US Embassy in Accra was smoother than I had thought, but it is perhaps, because I was going to the US at the invitation of the US Department of State Foreign Press Centre. And my experience at the Ethiopian Embassy so far was the best! Each time I had applied for a visa, it was issued the same day within an hour! And all I needed to submit were my passport, one passport photograph, an invitation letter from my hosts, an introduction letter from my office and the visa fee.

At the South African High Commission, I was asked to submit my hotel reservation form and bank statement, even though my trip was being fully sponsored by Siemens Southern Africa. I was asked to submit an introduction letter from my office, even though this is not indicated on the requirements for a visa on the application forms. It takes more than four hours to go through the visa application submission process with a cranky security man at the gates calling the shots and deciding on who he would let into the premises.

Meanwhile, the requirements for applying for a visa as stated on the application form are as follows: A passport; proof of booking of airline ticket; two identity passport photographs; prescribed visa fee if not exempted; supporting documentation confirming the purpose of the visit and vaccination certificate if required. But at the High Commission, officials would ask of bank statements and letter of introduction from employers - these are not stated among the requirements for visa application!

Travelling from Ghana to Nigeria by road can be a nightmare! The unnumerable security checkpoints on the roads and the extortions are just unbelievable, often done brazenly and cruelly in broad day light by uniformed officials on duty.

It is equally gruelling to travel from Ghana to Ivory Coast. Some of the drivers collect money from travellers to bribe officials on the way, just so they would have smooth passage.

Only last month the African Trade Policy Centre (ATPC) of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) organised the first Africa Trade Forum that looked at how Africa can trade itself out of poverty. And some of the issues that came up were the physical and non-physical barriers that exist beween African countries.

Although global trade is valued at around $30 trillion, Africa's share is only about 3% and intra-African trade is currently estimated at an abbysmal 10%.

It is necessary for African countries to take a second look at the facts that create these difficulties, that obviously hamper the continent's growth. It is being trumpeted now that this is Africa's time, as the continent has been experiencing growth, in the face of the challenges facing Europe and the US.

A good example that other African countries can also learn from is the relationship between neighbours South Africa and Namibia. As I experienced at the Hosea Kutako International Airport in Windhoek, I was able to purchase Internet airtime at the airport using the South African rand and was given change in the Namibian dollar. The currencies of the two countries are valued at one to one. I gave the attendant 100 rand as I bought 20 Namibian dollars worth of airtime, and I was given change of 60 Namibian dollars and 20 South African rand!

That certainly is a good example worth emulating by other African countries, apart from making travelling across the continent less cumbersome even as countries take into consideration security issues.

How Ghanaians abroad are building the national economy with remittances

2011-11-08T12:34:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Remittances from Ghanaians living abroad have become a very important component of Ghana’s economy.

By sending money home to relatives to cater for the sick, pay for education, acquire landed property and feed households, Ghanaians living abroad are building and sustaining the country’s economy.

The importance of remittances from Ghanaians abroad can be seen in the fact that it has outstripped even Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) or international aid.

Notwithstanding the fact that international aid is an important source of external finance for the government budget, the amount remitted into the country is above the total amount of ODA, consisting of loans and grants from donors.

Many of Ghana’s donors having realised that all non-income Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are likely to be missed, scaled-up their ODA to Ghana in recent years. ODA now accounts for about 42% of the national budget.

In 2009, the Bank of Ghana reports show that remittance inflows amounted to $1.6 billion, higher than the World Bank’s recorded $1.5 billion and almost 10 times the $114 million recorded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

There are over 500,000 Ghanaians living in the UK alone, the British High Commission in Accra has said, and according to the World Bank, there are 111,000 Ghanaians living in the US, making Ghana the fourth country with the highest number of its citizens living in the US after Nigeria, 211,000, Ethiopia, 140,000 and Egypt, 133,000.about 1000 Ghanaian doctors living and working in the US.

There are Ghanaians living and working almost in every corner of the world in various capacities who send money home to their relatives.

In 2010, remittances or private unrequited transfers (net) in the year amounted to $2.12 billion, the World Bank Ghana Country office told ghanabusinessnews.com. And that amount exceeds the total volume of ODA that the country received in that year.

According to figures provided to ghanabusinessnews.com by the Public Relations Office of the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, in 2010 the total amount of ODA the country received was $1.8 billion.

The breakdown as provided by the Ministry is as follows: Grants – $612 million; and Loans - $1,242 billion.

Remittance receipts in general, according to a joint publication by the World Bank (WB) and the African Development Bank (AfDB) titled, ‘Leveraging Migration for Africa’, generate large benefits for emigrants’ countries of origin.

“At the macro level, remittances tend to be more stable than other sources of foreign exchange; their variation is often countercyclical, helping sustain consumption and investment during downturns; and they improve sovereign creditworthiness, by increasing the level and stability of foreign exchange receipts,” it says.

At the micro level, it adds, both country studies and cross-country analyses have shown that remittances reduce poverty. They also spur spending on health and education, as a result of both higher household incomes and—according to some studies—the devotion of a larger share of remittances than other income sources to these services.

In addition, the study indicates that remittances provide insurance against adverse shocks by diversifying the sources of household income. For example, a recent study finds that Ethiopian households that receive international remittances are less likely than other households to sell their productive assets, such as livestock, to cope with food shortages.

According to the Migrations Factbook 2011, published by the World Bank, the stock of Ghanaian emigrants in 2010 was 824,900 and the stock of emigrants as percentage of population was 3.4%.

And it listed the following countries as top destinations for Ghanaians; Nigeria, Cote d’Ivoire, the US, UK, Burkina Faso, Italy, Togo, Germany, Canada and Liberia.

On skilled emigration for 2000, the Factbook states that the emigration rate of tertiary-educated Ghanaians was 46.9% of the population, 924 or 37.1% of physicians trained in the country, 1,639 or 55.9% of physicians born in the country. The number of nurses that left the country was 4,766 or 24.1% of nurses born in the country.

The WB, AfDB study says many migrants transfer funds to households in origin countries for the purpose of investment. “Data from household surveys reveal that households receiving international remittances from OECD countries have been making productive investments in land purchases, building houses, businesses, improving the farm, agricultural equipment and other investments (36 percent in Burkina Faso, 55 percent in Kenya, 57 percent in Nigeria, 15 percent in Senegal, and 20 percent in Uganda; figure 4.3). Households receiving transfers from other African migrants in other African countries set up small-scale businesses, such as restaurants and beauty salons. They also invest in housing.”

The study also shows that the African diaspora has invested in service sector activities, such as import/export companies, telecommunications, and tourism and transport companies (examples include Databank, in Ghana; Geometric Power Limited, in Nigeria; Teylium, in Senegal; and Celtel, in Sudan).

It cited the results of a survey of 302 returnees conducted in 2001 which indicates that more than half of Ghanaian and 23 percent of Ivorian returnees reported returning with more than $5,000 in savings (Black and Castaldo 2007). Both studies indicate that many return migrants invest in business activity and that work experience and the maintenance of communication with friends and family while abroad facilitates the opening a business upon return.

Cassini (2005) concludes, according to the study, that the most successful Ghana-based businesses of Ghanaian migrants were owned by migrants who visited home frequently and developed social networks.

The world descends on quiet Des Moines to discuss global food security

2011-10-16T04:09:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Des Moines is the capital of Iowa State, mid-west of the US. It is a quiet, beautiful town with a population of about 400,000.

But this quiet town is awake now, as the whole world is literally here to discuss how to secure the world’s future food production.

Global food prices are rising, and there is severe hunger and drought in the Horn of Africa. The situation in East Africa has attracted global attention, even though a little too late, efforts are being made to address the issue.

In Des Moines, pronounced ‘De Moine’, about 29 journalists from around the world have been nominated by the US Department of State Foreign Press Centre for the ‘Foreign Journalist Tour: Food Security’ reporting programme.

The World Food Prize is also organising the Norman E. Borlaug International Symposium during which the Laureate Award Ceremony would be held. Ghana’s former President John Kufuor and Brazil’s Lula da Silva will be jointly honoured for their efforts to end hunger in their countries, while they were presidents .

Kufuor is being honoured for the prudent policies initiated by his government towards food sufficiency.

“His administration helped to initiate or continue improvements in farming, nutrition, education, healthcare, and infrastructure, leading to significant positive changes in Ghana during the first decade of the new millennium.

“Today, Ghana is regarded as one of the most successful countries in sub-Saharan Africa. It recently attained middle-income status and will likely achieve the first Millennium Development Goal of cutting poverty in half before the target year of 2015,” a press statement from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) said in June.

“Under President Kufour’s leadership, Ghana became the first sub-Saharan African country to cut in half the proportion of its people who suffer from hunger, and the proportion of people living on less than a dollar per day, on course to achieve UN Millenium Development Goal 1 before the 2015 deadline.

“Continuing Ghana’s tradition of stability, President Kufour prioritised national agricultural policies: Ghana saw a reduction in its poverty rate from 51.7 percent in 1991 to 26.5 percent in 2008, and hunger was reduced from 34 percent in 1990 down to 9 percent in 2004,” it said.

IFPRI also acknowledged that, “President Kufour’s economic reforms, including the Food and Agriculture Sector Development Policy, provided incentives and strengthened public investments in the agricultural and food sector — the backbone of Ghana’s economy — which grew at a rate of 5.5 percent between 2003 and 2008,” adding that”Growth in the agricultural sector drove expansion in the national economy, with GDP quadrupling to 8.4 percent by 2008.”

“Under President Kufour, the Agricultural Extension Service was reactivated and special attention paid to educating farmers on best practices. As a result, Ghana’s cocoa production doubled between 2002 and 2005, and food crops such as maize, cassava, yams and plantains increased significantly, as did livestock production,” it adds.

The organisers were also impressed with Kufuor’s essay published by IFPRI. The essay was titled ‘Ghana’s Transformation’, in which Ghana’s former President gives a first-person account of his years as president, describing some of his administration’s most successful projects, especially those related to agriculture.

In the essay, President Kufour, who is currently a Global Ambassador against Hunger for the United Nations World Food Programme says, “Food is the most basic of needs, it decides not just the health of individuals but also the health of communities.”

Kufuor who describes food security as the catalyst for improving an economy and instituting democracy, served two terms as President of the Republic of Ghana from 2001 to 2008.

Achievements by this year’s winners also demonstrate that committed leadership combined with evidence-based policies can eliminate hunger and reduce poverty, says IFPRI.

On Brazil’s former president as joint winner, the World Food Prize Foundation said “President Lula da Silva made reducing poverty and hunger a top priority when he assumed the presidency of Brazil in 2003.

“The country’s Zero Hunger network of programmes represents one of the world’s leading efforts to decrease hunger and improve nutrition, providing greater access to food and education, increasing rural incomes, and empowering the poor. Under his leadership, Brazil cut hunger in half, exceeding the first Millennium Development Goal,” it adds.

Chicago’s O’hare International Airport was full on a sunny day Monday October 10, 2011 as larger than normal number of airlines landed with passengers on transit to Iowa. As our flight took off, it was the fourth plane in line taking off from the tarmac at the same time, and the waiting area was crowded leaving most Chicagoans wondering what is attracting such large numbers of visitors to the sleepy Mid-West town of Des Moines.

On transit in Chicago, I had the pleasant and rare opportunity of running into Sir Dawda Jawara, the former President of The Gambia. Until that great opportunity came, the closest I had come to him was what I had read about him in primary school. I didn’t miss a photo opportunity with him!

The town is so small that people walking by you on the street will stop and say hello!

But before I arrived in Des Moines, I already had links with the town that I have suddenly fallen in love with. When I told my friend Joyce Maxwell who lives in Massachusetts that I was coming to Des Moines, she told me her mother-in-law was born there. And then there is Ghanaian doctoral candidate at the Iowa Universtiy, Etse Sikanku, who has been looking forward to meeting with me whenever he came to Ghana, but now we will have the chance of meeting in Des Moines.

Traffic moves very fast on the roads, and I am yet to hear a car honk!

As I understand, it is also the heart of agriculture and food production in America. I have already seen the signs of some agribusiness institutions already.

As the events continue and come to a climax by October 15, 2011, quiet sleepy Des Moines would have spent long hours being awake, that it would probably sleep for a long time trying to catch up on lost sleep.

Remittances from Ghanaians abroad higher than international aid to country

2011-09-22T22:45:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Remittances from Ghanaians abroad is a major part of the country’s economy, available figures show.

And even though Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) or international aid is an important source of external finance for the government budget, the amount remitted into the country is above the total amount of ODA, consisting of loans and grants from donors.

Many of Ghana’s donors having realised that all non-income Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are likely to be missed, scaled-up their ODA to Ghana in recent years. ODA now accounts for about 42% of the national budget.

In 2009, the Bank of Ghana reports show that remittance inflows amounted to $1.6 billion, higher than the World Bank’s recorded $1.5 billion and almost 10 times the $114 million recorded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The significance of these citizens living abroad cannot be overlooked, as there are over 500,000 Ghanaians living in the UK alone and about 1000 Ghanaians doctors living and working in the US. There are Ghanaians living and working almost in every corner of the world in various capacities who send money to relatives back home.

In 2010, remittances or private unrequited transfers (net) in the year amounted to $2.12 billion, the World Bank Ghana Country office told ghanabusinessnews.com. And that amount exceeds the total volume of ODA that the country received in that year.

According to figures provided to ghanabusinessnews.com by the Public Relations Office of the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, in 2010 the total amount of ODA the country received was $1.8 billion.

The breakdown as provided by the Ministry is as follows: Grants – $612 million; and Loans - $1,242 billion.

Ghana’s efficient country system for aid management not complemented by donor conduct – Study

2011-09-13T08:56:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

A major new study on aid effectiveness to be published in the run-up to the High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness (HLF-4) in Busan, South Korea has found that even theough Ghana has made significant progress in applying Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) or international aid by using country systems, the unwillingness of donor countries to change their attitude is a drawback to achieving the objectives of the Paris Declaration (PD) and Accra Agenda for Action (AAA).

The study conducted by the European Network on Debt and Development (Eurodad), says ” While Ghana has made much progress in reforming country procurement systems, this progress does not seem to have been complemented by changes in donor conduct. Donors’ own reporting suggests that the extent to which they use country systems has not changed a great deal.”

The report to be published at the end of November 2011 focuses on six country case studies including Namibia, Uganda, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ghana.

The report titled, “How to spend it: smart procurement for more effective aid,” will be published to assess progress towards these aid effectiveness commitments. The report includes suggestions for a new and ambitious agreement in Busan and it constitutes one of the few civil society research reports ahead of the HLF4.

The report investigates how aid is actually spent, who the beneficiaries are and what the local economic impact is.

In its summary on Ghana, titled: “For whose gain? Procurement, tied aid and the use of country systems in Ghana”, the report argues that “the use of recipient country systems can increase the effectiveness of ODA by enhancing ownership and harmonization, reducing transaction costs and strengthening institutions.”

“Channelling ODA through country systems facilitates the alignment of aid allocation to national development plans. Using country systems is therefore a central pillar of the current aid effectiveness reform agenda as agreed on in international agreements, in particular the Paris Declaration and the Accra Agenda for Action,” it adds.

According to the report almost all of the donors interviewed for the study noted that in recent years progress has been made in improving Ghana’s public financial management and procurement systems.

“Past and ongoing reforms have enhanced donors’ confidence in the country systems, and scaled-up budget support has led to open dialogues between donors and Ghanaian authorities on the quality of the Public Financial Management (PFM) system, and how to improve it,” it says.

During interviews for the report most donors said they would channel more funds through the country system, in particular through the Multi-Donor Budgetary Support (MDBS) framework.

“However, the actual figures in the most recent official assessment, the 2008 Survey on Implementing the Paris Declaration (PD), give a different picture: the proportion of aid using country public financial management systems actually decreased to 57 per cent in 2007 from 62 per cent in 2005, contrary to the commitments made by donors,” the report says.

The report however, noted that the use of country procurement systems showed a slight increase, from 52% to 57%.

While it indicates that some donors, such as France and the Netherlands make full use of the country procurement system for all their ODA, it has been totally side-lined by others such as the USA and the African Development Bank (AfDB).

The report however says in a previous research on the use of country systems in Ghana carried out by Eurodad, it found that the US aid agencies are constrained by policies and regulations set at headquarter level. Moreover, the large number of vertical funds in Ghana, in particular in the health sector is also a contributing factor for the continued underuse of the country systems, despite an increase in their quality.

According to the report, some donors, mainly European Union (EU) Member States, explained that although they committed to using country systems as a first option, they use their own procurement procedures in cases where the procurement involves supplies or services which need to be procured internationally since they are not available on local markets.

Donor representatives also pointed to persistent structural or political constraints for using country systems. These are for example risk aversion by donor country parliaments which require that spending is visible and attributable, and well-documented and properly accounted for. Real or perceived fiduciary risks lead to the continued use of parallel implementation by donors. Some donors also continue to tie technical assistance and provide consultancies in kind rather than in cash, it said.

Citing a study by Osei Baffour titled “How tied aid affects the cost of aid-funded projects in Ghana“, in which he drew the conclusion that “there is significant mark-up on the prices of the tied funded inputs, and that the mark-up translates to a significant cost to Ghana,” the report said empirical research has shown that tied aid makes aid less efficient and less effective.

Since 2001, Ghana, the report noted has undertaken a large number of reforms of its Public Finance Management (PFM) system in general, and the procurement systems in particular. Central is the Public Procurement Act, passed in 2003, which provides a comprehensive legal framework for public procurement. New institutions such as the Public Procurement Authority (PPA) and the Appeals and Complaints Panel have been set up to formalise and improve procurement processes, it says.

It also acknowledged that the development of software for procurement planning, a standard bid document and short –term training modules as well as the Public Procurement Model of Excellence (PPME) for assessment and monitoring have aided in enhancing the image of public procurement.

Several interviewees, the study said, explained that the PPME represents a significant step forward for monitoring the performance of public procurement entities and their compliance with the legal provisions.

The PPA and the Auditor General have indicated that the implementation of the Act has reduced leakages and led to more transparency in public spending. However, many government officials’ respondents bemoaned the delays associated with the implementation, it added.

The study therefore, recommends among others that all donors should deliver on their aid effectiveness commitments and use country procurement systems as the first option, while at the same time providing scaled-up support to strengthen local procurement capacities and improve accountability of the procurement process.

It suggests further that, where donors continue to procure themselves, they should end all practices of formal and de facto aid tying. They should also thoroughly assess their procurement practices and remove all barriers which hinder better access and participation of local economic actors, with the final aim of maximizing the share of contracts which are awarded to Ghanaian firms.

Rise in world food prices has implications for Ghana

2011-09-07T07:02:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

I first wrote and published this article elsewhere in 2008 at the onset of the global financial and food crises.

As the world faces the emergence of another food crisis, I thought I should share with you, especially if you didn't get the chance to read it.

Ghana’s recent successes in the agriculture sector could suffer setbacks as a result of the rise in world food prices if the appropriate steps are not taken.

Ghana is still celebrating the positive mention it received in the recently launched World Development Report 2008 of the World Bank. In this Report, Ghana was extensively used as a case study, indeed as a success story in agricultural growth in sub-Sahara Africa, including halving poverty by Millineum Development Goal benchmarks.

Unfortunately, the rise in world food prices for grains, especially wheat, could possibly erode the gains made in agriculture in the country.

The world price of wheat has risen to $19.88 a bushel on the Minneapolis Grain Exchange (MGE) according to the website, World Socialist, and that rise is 79% higher than a year ago. The site says that the surge was as a result of the announcement that Japan had purchased 190,000 tons of US wheat shortly after the Egyptian government bought 235,000 tons, and in anticipation of weather-related food disruptions in China.

The Financial Times (FT) reports that in Chicago wheat and rice prices for delivery in March 2008 have jumped to an all-time record, soyabean prices are at a 34-year high and corn prices at an 11-year peak.

In early trading on Monday according to the FT, the new benchmark price of wheat for March delivery rose 30 cents to $10.09½ a bushel, more than 7.5 per cent higher than the expiring December contract of $9.39 and first time it has traded over $10 a bushel. The December contract expired on Friday and the March 2008 contract became the market’s benchmark on Monday.

New benchmark prices for corn are also more than 5 per cent higher than previously. Corn for March 2008 rose to $4.43¼ a bushel, the highest level in 11 years for a front-month contract.

The benchmark prices for soyabeans delivered in January rose on Friday to a fresh 34-year high of $11.92¼ a bushel.

Rice, also for January, has jumped to an all-time high of $13.310 a hundredweight.

The FT report quotes Bill Lapp, analyst at US consultancy, Advanced Economic Solutions as saying “We’ve already seen food prices increase this year at their fastest pace since the early 1980s, but the full brunt of those increases will begin in earnest in 2008.”

The agricultural commodities price rises are the result of high demand, poor harvests and low stockpiles of food. Emerging economies, where rising incomes are boosting consumption of meat and dairy products, have added to pressures already generated by the biofuel industry.

Cereal supply was this season lower than expected as several countries suffered weather-related losses. Jean Bourlot, head of agriculture commodities at Morgan Stanley in London, said: “High cereals prices are here to stay.”

The US Department of Agriculture has predicted that global corn stocks will fall to a 33-year low of just 7.5 weeks of consumption, while global wheat stocks will plunge to their lowest level in at least 47 years at 9.3 weeks.

But the World Food Programme (WFP) has predicted that the price of wheat will remain high for atleast the next two years.

According to the group, Action Against Hunger, an NGO that is in the forefront of fighting hunger in the world, the cause of the rise in the world price of cereals was due to some factors including increased consumption of cereals both as food and for animal feed in China and Brazil.

The challenges facing food production in most parts of the world according to Action Against Hunger are, biofuel production, increase in fuel prices, and global warming.

Biofuel’s effect on food production is as a result of the use of productive land for the production of non-food crops.

The increase in fuel prices has affected agricultural production, because farmers have to pay more for less energy sources to produce.

The effects of global warming on the world is being felt in the loss of water sources. Most of the world’s water sources are drying up as a result, and this is affecting agricultural production.

There is also the challenge posed by deforestation, loss of soil fertility and land degradation which have resulted from other industrial activities.

Most developing countries now have to spend a lot more on food imports. It is estimated that developing countries spend between 70%-80% of their budget on food imports.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the global trade in foodstuffs has grown rapidly and changed radically over recent decades. Between 1970 and 2001, gross world food imports, measured in terms of calorie equivalents, rose by almost 60 percent.

But this growth differed markedly among both country and commodity groups.

The FAO reports that gross imports of food by developing countries grew by 115 percent over this period. Imports by developed countries, which already import a higher proportion of their food, grew by 45 percent.

A closer look at the data reveals that food imports by developing countries increased rapidly during the 1970s, grew more slowly during the 1980s and accelerated again over the 1990s. This pattern holds true both for the volume of food imports and for the ratio of food imports to availability for consumption per capita.

The expansion of food imports meant that the food trade surplus of US$1 billion of developing countries was transformed into a deficit of more than US$11 billion during this period. Moreover, this trend is expected to continue: according to FAO projections, by the year 2030, the net food trade deficit of developing countries is expected to swell to more than US$50 billion in constant 1997-99 US$.

These figures do not portend good for developing countries in the light of the challenges.

African countries in particular, like Sierra Leone and Liberia that depend so much on rice and Kenya which depends on corn are likely to be hard hit by the developments.

Ghana, which also imports a large amount of rice would likely face great constraints on the country’s budget.

According to the FAO, at an annual growth rate of 12.84 per cent, Ghana’s rice import grew from 121,000 metric tons in 1993 to 507,600 metric tons in 2002.

An environmental group, Environmental Rights Action, based in Nigeria, has put Ghana’s rice imports from the USA alone at 166.400 metric tons between 2004 and 2005.

The challenges that the rise in world food prices could pose to Ghana, is the diversion of funds for other sectors into food importation.

This could bring short term relief. But for a long term approach to the challenge, the Ghana government must go back to the drawing board and have a second look at agriculture in the country.

Particular attention should be given to developing irrigation systems.

Agriculture research institutions should also be given attention and the funding they require to develop new varieties of crop for farmers, especially pest and disease resistant varieties.

While Ghanaians are entitled to celebrate the achievements documented in the World Bank’s World Development Report 2008, the challenges posed by the rise in world food prices, should goad the country on to more pragmatic and goal oriented agricultural practices.

It is time to move away from lip service to the agriculture sector, it is time to put more money where it is needed most, and that is the agriculture sector, so that Ghanaians can be well fed, because well fed citizens always have the energy to build a better, stronger nation.

How Ghana curbed maternal mortality with international aid

2011-08-25T06:57:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Adwoa Kesewa is 19-years-old. She has to drop out of Junior High School(JHS) when she got pregnant. Her 21-year-old boyfriend Kwesi Prah also a school drop-out, suggested abortion, but Adwoa refused, citing the fear of death and the fact that she has heard if things went wrong she might never be able to conceive in the future.

In anger and frustration, he warned her sternly to stay away from him if she keeps the pregnancy as he is in no position as a truck pusher to support her and the baby. “You should not even mention me as the one responsible for your pregnancy! You are on your own now,” he growled. Kwesi bare survives on his meagre income as a truck pusher at one of the markets in Accra to be able to support a mother and a child.

“You said you loved me, and you will never leave me. But you are now turning your back to me, is this my reward for all that I have done for you?,” Adwoa muttered with tears streaming down her cheeks.

Adwoa’s story is common in urban and rural Ghana, where young people without sufficient sex education, with little or no vocational training and no jobs become parents when they are not ready.

With no regular sources of income or sufficient funds they are unable to acquire ante-natal care, and the pressure on the national budget for health, especially as malaria management takes a large chunk of the resources other areas within the health sector are deprived of funds.

In 2009, Ghana’s Minister of Health at that time, Dr. George Sipa-Adjah Yankey said the government spends over $760 million every year treating malaria.

The amount used in treating malaria is almost the entire budget for the health sector. In the 2009 budget for instance, an amount of over GH¢921 million was allocated to the health sector. What that means is that very little is left of the budget to treat other diseases.

The British government intervened by providing funds for maternal health care in Ghana.
In 2008 the British government provided a grant amounting to £42.5 million to support a government programme to provide free maternal health care for women. The programme is aimed at reducing the country’s maternal mortality ratio by three quarters before 2015.

In 2003, Ghana’s maternal mortality ratio was high. The country was recording one death per every 35 women during pregnancy or child birth. A World Health Organisation (WHO) report put the maternal mortality ratio in the country at 540 deaths per 100,000 live births.

But before the inception of the free maternal health care programme in Ghana in 2008, the World Bank funded the National Health Insurance programme in 2006, through which the country made a strong effort to extend health insurance coverage to people employed in the informal and rural sectors. More than half of Ghana’s population is now covered, according to the World Bank.

About 70 percent of the insured, including children and pregnant women, are exempt from paying premiums. The 2009 Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) shows at least 90 percent of pregnant women use antenatal care services, and births attended by skilled health staff rose from 40 percent (1990) to 59 percent (2008).

Following the beginning of the free maternal health care programme, Ghana received commendation from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).

The Executive Director of the UNFPA, Ms Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, said it was good that Ghana introduced the programme as a way to control the high maternal mortality rate in the country in efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDG5), which aimed at improving maternal health.

She was cited in a report by the Ghana News Agency (GNA) as saying: “This means if the programme is well sustained, all pregnant women, right at the community level would have access to free maternal health care, thus preventing a woman from dying from childbirth”

However, there have been calls for more to be done to make the programme sustainable and some challenges have been identified.

One of the major challenge facing the programme is ironically low patronage of antenatal care in some health facilities in Ghana.

According to a GNA report the low patronage of antenatal care and normal delivery care services at the lower level health facilities in Ghana could affect the sustainability of the free maternal health services.

The report citing Dr Emmanuel Ankrah Odame, head of the Public Health Division of Ridge Hospital said cost of free maternal services have been consistently higher at high level facilities putting so much stress on the British grant meant to improve financial access to maternal services.

Dr Odame said in order to reduce Ghana’s maternal mortality rate from the 451 per 100,000 live births and meet the Millennium Development Goal 5 (MDG5) by 2015, there was the need to sustain the free maternal health services and ensure that people access the lower levels of health facilities.

According to him, when the pressures put on the high level hospitals are not lowered the facilities in the southern center of the country alone could exhaust the British Grant in 13 years.

Dr Odame, according to the report therefore, recommended the placement of specialists in the lower facilities to attend to clients, saying, “this will let pregnant women access the lower level facilities and not use the issue of no specialists as an excuse.”

Despite the challenges however, available research data shows that Ghana has made tremendous strides in curtailing maternal and child mortality.

An estimation taken in 2001 showed that maternal deaths in the year 2000 stood at 740 per 100,000 live births.

However, the 2010 World Health Organization Report shows that maternal mortality has reduced to 560 per 100,000 live births in the country.

These achievements couldn’t have been possible without international assistance, looking at the fact that other areas within the health sector are competing for scarce resources. And young women like Adwoa, would have become part of the statistics without the free maternal health care programme.

As the world gathers in Busan, South Korea in November for the 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness to discuss the Paris Declaration and Accra Agenda for Action (AAA), Ghana’s success in the area of maternal health care which has been implemented with funds from international donors can be showcased as a success story of aid effectiveness.

Tackling corruption is necessary for achieving aid effectiveness

2011-08-16T02:01:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

For most developing countries, international development assistance (IDA) or aid is a very important component of national budgets without which a lot of development projects in health, education, water and sanitation, security, infrastructure development and transportation could not be achieved. Ghana for instance received as much as $1.2 billion in grants in 2009.

However, corruption remains one of the biggest means of revenue and income loss to developing countries.

While it is not easy to define corruption in one specific term, its different manifestations lead to loss of much needed money that otherwise could have gone to use in the public good or welfare of the majority. Corruption is an effective means of siphoning public funds into private pockets of individuals and companies.

A study by the World Bank says nearly $1 trillion is lost to corruption around the world every year.

The World Bank also says billions of dollars are lost through corruption in developing countries each year.

And for a continent like Africa that has an infrastructure financing gap of $35 billion per year, tackling corruption must be a priority. Ghana for instance requires $1.6 billion annually for its infrastructure development.

According to the World Bank, although the exact magnitude of the proceeds of corruption circulating in the global economy is impossible to ascertain, estimates demonstrate the severity and scale of the problem.

“An estimated $20 to $40 billion is lost to developing countries each year through corruption”, the Bank said in a report titled “Barriers to Asset Recovery” which was released Tuesday, June 21, 2011.

According to the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre, 2007, 25% of the GDP of African states is lost to corruption. It adds that the amount lost to corruption each year totals $148 billion. And this amount it says covers the full range of corruption, from petty bribes to inflated public procurement contracts.

The World Bank, Star Report of 2007 also indicates that proceeds of corruption in bribes received by public officials from developing and transition countries are estimated to be between $20 billion to $40 billion per year, and this figure is equivalent to 20% to 40% of Official Development Assistance (ODA).

The devastating effects of corruption can be felt in poor quality of services in health, roads and education.

A Transparency International Global Corruption Report of 2006 estimates that 50% of health funds is lost to corruption. The report says this is the estimated percentage of allocated funds that do not reach health facilities in Ghana.

A UNDP report titled Accelerating Human Development in Asia and the Pacific released in 2008 says corruption accelerates the depletion of natural resources, notably primary forests and inshore fishing grounds, which many communities rely on for their livelihoods.

And citing an example, the report says the government of Indonesia has estimated that lost forest revenue costs the nation up to $4 billion a year or around five times the annual budget for the Indonesian department of health.

Corruption is also a major setback to achieving the Millennium Development Goals in many developing countries.

According to a Transparency International Report released in 2008, corruption raises the cost of connecting a household to a water network by as much as 30%, inflating the cost of achieving the MDG on water and sanitation by more than $48 billion or nearly half of annual global aid outlays.

It has been found that Ghana had met only 45% of the commitments it had pledged to improving water and sanitation in Washington DC in 2010 where the government pledged to invest $200 million a year in providing water and sanitation, which means that the country is still not going to meet its MDG target.

Corruption is a major hindrance to aid effectiveness and therefore, should be one of the issues that the 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness (HLF-4) in Busan, South Korea gives considerable attention to.

The principles of the Paris Declaration which stipulates Ownership, Alignment, Harmonisation, Results and Mutual Accountability can be effectively implemented if corruption is put on the radar.

The ideals of the Paris Declaration that it is now the norm for aid recipients to forge their own national development strategies with their parliaments and electorates (ownership); for donors to support these strategies (alignment) and work to streamline their efforts in-country (harmonisation); for development policies to be directed to achieving clear goals and for progress towards these goals to be monitored (results); and for donors and recipients alike to be jointly responsible for achieving these goals (mutual accountability) can effectively be reached if corruption is tackled.

In the same vein, the Accra Agenda for Action or AAA should also be pursued with zero-tolerance for corruption.

The AAA which takes stock of progress and sets the agenda for accelerated advancement towards the Paris targets, proposes the following three main areas for improvement:

Ownership – that countries have more say over their development processes through wider participation in development policy formulation, stronger leadership on aid co-ordination and more use of country systems for aid delivery.

Inclusive partnerships – which requires that all partners – including donors in the OECD Development Assistance Committee and developing countries, as well as other donors, foundations and civil society – participate fully.

Delivering results – that aid is focused on real and measurable impact on development.

With the counter-productive and development-eroding effects of corruption, the hard work of dedicated civil servants, citizens, honest governments and civil society in developing countries won’t amount to the money’s worth of donor countries and agencies, and development targets can’t be attained no matter how much aid money is given to developing countries if the canker of corruption is not tackled headlong.

The development of country systems and capacity development must factor the fashioning of anti-corruption mechanisms to keep an eye on the efficient and effective use of aid.

Ghana expected to shift attention from mining to oil

2011-08-03T05:52:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The government of Ghana is expected to shift its attention from the mining sector following the emergence of the country’s oil sector, which is seen to be leading the economy since commercial production began on December 15, 2010, according to a Business Monitor International (BMI) Ghana Mining Report for the third quarter of 2011.

The report says the shift of attention from the mining sector over the next few years will be necessitated by a drop in revenues from mineral output, expected to fall to 2.4% of GDP from 7.4% in 2010 by end of BMI’s 2011-2015 forecast period.

Despite the fall however, BMI says it still sees a healthy mining sector growth going forward, “particularly as regards gold production, as a number of new projects come on line.”

“We see further opportunities outside of the gold sub-sector with Ghana’s bauxite industry hoped finally to begin operating at its full potential following the acquisition of a majority share in the country’s Awaso mine by Chinese mining firm Bosai Minerals Group, ” it says.

The takeover is expected to coincide with the building of an integrated aluminium production facility at the mining complex and we project overall bauxite production to increase by more than 60% over the forecast period, it indicated.

According to BMI, Ghana’s share of global gold production has risen gradually in recent years as foreign investment in the mining sector has increased.

“The country’s contribution to African gold production has grown more markedly still, increasing from 14.1% of overall output in 2006 to 19.7% in 2009 while gaining ground on the continent’s largest producer, South Africa. We expect production to continue to trend upwards over our mid-term forecast period,” it says.

Citing preliminary statistics from Ghana’s Chamber of Mines, it says the country’s gold production grew at 2.5% in 2010 to 2.97 million ounces reflecting the positive trend in international gold prices over the year.

It says gold production will continue to drive industry growth with several major new projects due to come on line over its mid-term forecast period.

“The largest of these, Newmont Mining’s Akyem mine in the country’s Eastern region will add an additional 500kozpa to Ghana’s production when it begins operations by end-2013,” it adds.

Mining has been going on in Ghana for more than 100 years. Oil production started on December 15, 2010.

Meanwhile, Ghana’s Minister of Finance, Dr. Kwabena Duffuor said the government is expecting to earn GH¢1.2 billion from oil in 2011.

On Thursday July 14, 2011, when he went to Parliament to seek approval for a supplementary expenditure for 2011, he said the estimate was based on the new oil price assumption of $100 per barrel as well as the revised estimated average oil production of 84,737 barrels per day and the new exchange rate assumption, total revenue from oil including the National Oil Company’s carried and participation interest.

He however indicated that, of this amount the Benchmark Revenue is estimated at GH¢923.4 million.

The remaining, he said is the amount due the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) as its equity and cash ceded to it.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

Mobile Number Portability begins in Ghana - Are you ready to change your network provider?

2011-07-07T14:22:00.000-07:00

Today July 7, 2011, Mobile Number Portability (MNP) comes into effect in Ghana, bringing another revolution into the country’s already dynamic telecoms industry.

On Thursday June 30, 2011, Parliament adopted the report of the Committee on Subsidiary Legislation on the Mobile Number Portability (MNP) Regulations 2011, Legislative Instrument (LI) 1994, and by that action, MNP received the legal backing to begin.

MNP is a process that allows a mobile subscriber who for any reason chooses to change from the existing provider to a competitor to do so and still keep his or her favourite mobile number including the code.

Porting is a process that allows subscribers on network ‘A’ to move to network ‘B’ without having to be assigned a new number. This development is likely to make Ghana’s telecoms sector which industry players have described as ‘extremely competitive’ even more competitive. And this competition has been cited to have led to innovation in the sector.

Initially, MNP was scheduled to have started on July 1, 2011, but was postponed to July 7, because July 1 was a public holiday.

The system to be implemented in Ghana, according to Mr. Joshua K. Peprah, Director, Regulatory Administration at the NCA is “recipient network driven”. What this means, he says, is that the network that the subscriber is switching to is the one to initiate the move. “The subscriber only has to go to the recipient network, or the network he or she wants to switch to and the switch is initiated at that point.”

He said the donor network or the network provider the subscriber is switching from would only have to accept or reject with reasons.

According to the NCA there are only few reasons for rejecting porting. These are: number not being active on the donor network – that is the network that a subscriber is moving away from. Fraud having been reported; phone reported stolen; not enough of the ID items matching with the request.

The request to port to a different operator may not be rejected in the case of debt still owed to the donor network, according to the NCA.

It also says the donor network is obliged to refund any unused portion of deposit that the customer paid to it, after subtracting unpaid bills and usage that has not yet been billed, especially in the case of post-paid customers.
Prepaid subscribers however, would lose their credit if they switch to another provider before they have exhausted their calling credit, the NCA says.

The porting or switching to a new provider, according to the NCA, can be done within 24 hours of the request.
It is however, not clear who the biggest gainers would be among the country’s five mobile operators. Six companies are licensed to operate in Ghana – these are MTN, Vodafone, Tigo, Airtel, Expresso and Globacom. But Globacom is yet to start operations.

Even though, some subscribers are excited about the prospects, and have indicated their desire to port, service quality, price and what other value added services the providers offer are likely to determine which network the largest number of subscribers would move to.

Some mobile subscribers on Facebook have written on their pages that they would port. One person however, wrote on the Facebook page: “A friend’s description of MNP is moving from one crappy network to anoter”.

The steps to porting are simple. A subscriber who wants to port would have to go to the recipient operator or provider that he or she wants to switch to with the phone. Subscriber must have a valid ID card to be able to initiate the process, because ownership of the phone would be verified, it is important that one uses the same ID card that one used to register the phone.

The recipient network would initiate all the necessary processes and a new SIM card would be provided to the subscriber, provided there are no valid reasons as outlined by the NCA for the donor network to reject the porting request.

Porting should have cost the subscriber $2.5 but some of the providers, have offered to absorb cost.

Are you ready to port?

When Ghana becomes a theatre for political jingoism

2011-03-31T03:27:00.000-07:00

by Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Ghana, once and always a beautiful country, has now been turned into a theatre of some sort for the display of the theatrical skills of a few in a play I choose to call “political jingoism”.

Never mind what I mean. You don’t have to look far to make meaning of this title. Simply pick any Ghanaian newspaper you can lay hands on and read just the front page. You will find the meaning of the title of the play.

It is the misdirected struggle for power we call politics. The abuse of power, corruption, cronyism, patronage, and lack of respect for due procedure, statism and the lethargic performance we are told to call statecraft.

The story is both an irony and tragedy intertwined between sheer sarcasm and surprisingly some hazy sense of altruism, rather beautifully scripted to excite the restless minds of the millions of hapless Ghanaians and to lull them into taking some sort of placebo.

I shudder to say, that not only is the stage filled with self-conceited and self-appointed so called political elites, they have also arrogated to themselves the right to determine how the rest of Ghanaians think, live or even die.

The scenes are haphazardly arranged and the lines are muttered in most often inaudible tones, letting out not so much discernible phrases.

Hasn’t our kind of politics become the bane of Ghana? I would say it has, quiet clearly the meaning of politics has been so obscured that it is not what it ought to be anymore. It is now like an auctioned piece of valuable, only the highest bidder can afford. The ordinary man, no matter how wise or gifted he is in leadership would not dare to show interest in it. Because it has been made expensive too.

Meanwhile, the waters have been so muddied and the path so murky that nothing decent would be permitted to appear on the stage.

Believe it or not, the harbingers of truth, the media, and the press have been cajoled into endorsing and applauding this perfidy.

The media, watchdog of the society, ‘Fourth Estate of the Realm’, has become lethargic, often appearing moronic and absolutely clueless, not knowing what its role in the lounge of this theatre is. Eventually becoming a lapdog! Lapping up every and anything the paymasters spew out!

Truly, no matter how hard the media has tried to justify her connivance in the gargantuan fraud of an opera that is been inflicted on Ghanaians, she could not exonerate herself. Because, Ghanaians are not so credulous, they are knowledgeable enough, and so they know. They know that the media has shirked her responsibility for a pottage of meat. For temporary pleasure and personal gain, the media has become part of the theatre - acting roles, applauding and sometimes reviewing the play with cooked up surveys and public relations gimmicks that are obviously tailored to massage the ego of the dramatists.

Ghanaians are not so irreverent of life, they have for so long held the sanctity of human life with high regard, but the show has so inundated their collective conscience so as to maim its ability to show open disdain for ignominy. And possibly this could be accounting for the public show of the open thirst for human blood that is exhibited in unrestrained callousness and brutality before our very eyes.

Daylight robberies and murders are being witnessed with its concomitant heartlessness. In the face of these plagues, the theatre still goes on undisturbed. The actors are acting with such fervour and excitement as though possessed by the one time famous Tigari shrine. It is difficult to tell what is goading them on.

What could be their inspiration? I mean the actors in this theatre of political jingoism. Probably, their motivation is the greed for popularity and filthy lucre and or the sheer delight of being seen on any part of the stage regardless of what role they are playing either major or minor. Or it is to satisfy their insatiable hunger for power? May be, no one knows.

I could guess that if Karl Marx was alive today in Ghana, he would do one of these two. He would either abandon his ideas and dreams for a socialist world in despair or he would simply gather the masses to resist the pretenders on the stage and upstage the cast to bring the reveling actors’ hypocrisy to an end.

Marx’s historical materialism was rejected in his time, but became very popular during the 70s, especially in Latin America and in parts of Africa. But sadly, it was practiced and followed by half-baked zealots wearing the garb of politicians and revolutionists.

And then there was western democracy which certainly stood at variance with Marxism, but both ideologies were clear as to what they wanted their worlds to look like both ideally and realistically.

Western democracy preached freedom to live and to have as much as you want if you are strong enough to, while Marxism believed in equality for everyone including equal access to resources, where the supremacy of the state reigns.

For western democracy again, the guidelines included an open and fair playing field for all or so it is said, and it comes with a baggage, known simply as capitalism. The unfettered officially and morally authorized greed for profit by all means possible. It comes so often with truncated and vague labour laws that always make the employer the king and the employee the loyal servant, locking the two in a marriage of convenience to the disadvantage of the worker.

It also comes with a judicial system that always lends itself to manipulation by the rich and famous, and mostly treated with suspicion by the ordinary person.

Just take a look at the so called socialists among the cast, they are simply mischievous. They claim allegiance to Marxist ideology but cling so tightly to the fringe cloths of unfettered capitalism and its insatiability for vulgarity, ostentatious living and intellectual skulduggery.

Ghanaians are a very noble and dignified people. But they have been dealt a raw deal. They did not bargain for this kind of tragicomedy, in fact, they have been shortchanged.

I remember one politician in this country referring to his opponents as ‘riff-raffs.’ It was in the heat of some political speech of some sort on a political platform of a kind. He was said to have made the statement in the heat of party political campaign. Of course they all do that and always too. They mount party platforms and say things they couldn’t say even to five-year-olds.

This nice fellow who most probably got drunk with political fresh wine and labeled his opponents was later reported to have apologized and even hoped for a role in the cast. But he never got it.

Others have even called their own colleagues thieves, when they haven’t caught them stealing anything. And when they are reminded that the lines in the script are not clean enough, they plead temporary insanity sometimes from the blinding effects of high anticipation of being in power and ruling the whole country or some part of it like a constituency.

But you see, on this stage where mediocrity is sanctioned and applauded, these actors can say anything and get away with it. Sometimes, it appears Ghanaians like it that way. It appears as though, they really do not care, and ably supported by the media, these actors continue with careless abandon to go on with the show in clear disregard for any rules of etiquette on stage, decorum or even show some restraint for the sake of posterity.

Well, the play goes on, the theatre of political jingoism which premiered long ago and is in top gear is revealing to discerning minds the ludicrous and yet not too hilarious part of some of the actors.

As the show goes on, it is not likely Ghanaians would like to continue watching it, because, it is getting rather boring. It is yielding very little returns for most Ghanaians. They can hardly derive any mirth from the show being put up by an amateurish cast acting in frenzy.

What could have become a beautiful show has been twisted into a scary re-enactment of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, where treachery, blood thirstiness, greed, betrayal and disguised corruption have become the norm.

But hopefully, these theatricals would have to come to an end one day. The curtains would surely come down.

And then the day would come, when Ghanaians would be entertained with the most beautiful and appropriate play that they so much deserve, and with it, the quality of life that the Ghanaian must rightly enjoy.

African proverbs and gender construction - Perspectives on women

2011-03-07T04:34:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

I wrote and published this article elsewhere about four years ago. As the International Women's Day is celebrated March 8, 2011, I have decided to share it with cherished readers here, hoping that it would generate some discussions.

Introduction

The African continent is known for its rich oral traditions. Proverbs are the most widely and commonly used in this tradition of oral arts. The use of proverbs permeates the entire African society - it is the foundation of social and cultural wisdom.

The influence of proverbs on African thought is so strong to the point that even the concept of gender is so persistently carved from it.

According to Ssetuba (2002:1) in Africa, “the proverb is regarded as a noble genre of African oral tradition that enjoys the prestige of a custodian of a people’s wisdom and philosophy of life.”

Finnegan (1970:390) also posits that “in many African cultures a feeling for language, for imagery, and for the expression of abstract ideas through compressed and allusive phraseology comes out particularly clearly in proverbs.”

Finnegan’s idea is reflected in this Igbo proverb which says, “Proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten.” (Oha, 1998:87). If proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten, it is logical then for words that portray gender to be embraced in proverbs.

Proverbs, therefore, to a large extent form the basis of African thought, including gender construction.

There is however, a disturbing trend in the interpretation of proverbs. In African societies, proverbs are considered to be absolute truths. Major decisions in life are often taken based on truths that are inherent in proverbs.

Ssetuba (2002) reports, “definitions of the term ‘proverb’ have centred on its economy of words, origins in human experience and observation of social phenomenon, folkloric and communal belonging as well as the claim of being general or absolute truth. Of all the definitional ingredients, the claim over truthfulness is rather disturbing. It actually reflects the user’s or society’s aspiration for control and desire to impose a given view of life as unshakeable and accepted. This is where the proverb helps patriarchy to live on from generation to generation by presenting it as a stable immutable part of social order.”

African proverbs as source of wisdom

According to Gyekye (1996), wisdom, like knowledge, is conceived in traditional African societies as having a practical as well as a theoretical dimension, but theoretical wisdom must have direct relevance to practical problems of life, to dealing with concrete human problems. The intellectual activities of the traditional African sages, or thinkers, are of course theoretical, even though the basis of their wisdom is in human experience. African maxims, which are generally the creations of the sages, are intended to convey truths that are profound and abstract.

He argues further that, wisdom - both practical and theoretical-is, in the Akan culture, contrasted with foolishness or stupidity. The fool is a person who not only cannot comprehend or disentangle theoretical matters but also cannot apply his mind to dealing with practical issues, even issues concerning his own life.

Regarding the theoretical ineptitude of the fool, there is an Akan maxim that contrasts foolishness with theoretical wisdom:

“It is only the fool to whom a proverb is explained.”

Another Akan maxim says that the wise person, however, has the intellectual ability to grasp the profound meaning of a maxim, to comprehend the implications of such pithy sayings:

“The wise person is spoken to in proverbs, not in words [or, speeches].

The fool is constantly confused, unable to sort out the practical issues that affect his own well-being. He is careless with his life, not giving the required attention or concentration to what he wants to do. Thus the following maxims:

“When the fool is squandering his gold, he says his scales are out of order.”

“It is the fool whose own tomatoes are sold to him”.

From Gyekye’s view, it is evident to draw the inference that, in African societies, the influence of proverbs is pervasive. Wisdom is expressed in proverbs. A wise person must understand proverbs and be able to use these wise sayings to solve some of the daunting issues of life. Invariably, one of the daunting tasks confronting humans is how to perceive him or her self and how to conduct life as either male or female.

Difference between gender and sex

All societies across the world are generally male dominated. Patriarchy is viewed as legitimate by men, because it keeps women in subordinate positions to the advantage of men who do not want to lose the privileged roles, and therefore, the power their gender as men gives them, including access to power and the scarce resources available to all.

Sex refers to the biological difference of male or female. Our sexual organs are different, our hormones and chemical functions are different. Our biological and physiological conditions as male or female are obviously different. Women get pregnant and give birth, and men don’t. These fixed biological and physiological differences are what define sex.

Gender, on the other hand, is the result of cultural, social and psychological factors. These are differences acquired not through birth, but through socialization. People are brought up to act and think as male or female. Every society establishes a set of accepted behaviours to which males and females are expected to conform.

According to Hussein, “gender ideology is a systematic set of cultural beliefs through which society constructs and wields its gender relations and practices.” He argues further that, “gender ideology contains legends, narratives and myths about what it means to be a man or a woman and suggests how each should behave in the society.”

According to Hussein a society’s gender ideology is grounded largely in religious and social principles, which are then used as grounds to justify different rights, responsibilities and rewards to each gender.

Indeed, every society has a set of systems to censure and control the normative concepts of masculine and feminine behaviours. For example, “some occasions are organized to routinely display and celebrate behaviours that are conventionally linked to one or the other sex category.” (West and Zimmerman, 1987:139).

The African gender ideology is a system of shaping different lives for men and women by placing them in different social positions and patterns of expectations. In Africa, rituals, legends, name-giving ceremonies, oral narratives, proverbs, aphorisms and usages have been in the vanquard of mobilizing gender ideology. (CGSPS, 2001; Oha, 1998; Oluwole, 1997).

According to Hussein, (2004), and Oha (1998), the African oral traditions portray women in general as foolish, weak, jealous, evil, unfaithful, dependent, frivolous and seductive. However, there is the other image of women in African oral traditions, which reflects women a symbol of warmth and all nourishing goodness.

The oral traditions cultivate also, men’s prerogatives to the allegiance and subservience of women, and legitimize men to exercise their power over women to sustain the latter’s subordination and marginalization.

FGM as a means of control

This notion of control is reflected in the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). The idea is to deny women the ability to have sexual pleasure, because the woman is thoroughly, an object of a man’s pleasure. This notion of a woman’s sexuality belonging to a man is vividly illustrated in this Igbo proverb: “A woman carrying a vagina would ask to be sexed, that the vagina is her own, but when it causes trouble, the (real owner of the vagina) would be looked for.” (Oha, 1998).

So from this proverb, a woman does not even have the right to her own sexuality. The idea in the proverb explicitly denies the woman her right to sexual pleasure.

Just being curious. Let me ask. Does that explain why Ghanaian men are not romantic?

Gender and intelligence

According to Oboler, men are believed to be more intelligent than women. Women are thought particularly to be incapable of foresight and lack the ability to make and carry through sensible and realistic plans.

For this reason, it is generally agreed that husbands should administer the family estate and wives for the most part concur with husbands’ plans. It is commonly claimed that if a woman tried to manage property, she would very likely make a mess of it. (Oboler, 1985; 60, cited in Bulow, 1993;539).

An Akan proverb entrenches this idea when it says, “when a woman buys a gun, it is kept in a man’s room.” This proverb shows that women do not have the capacity and ability to manage valuable property¸ an indication that they must play insignificant and subordinate roles to men with regards to property ownership.

As a result, it is common to find in most African societies, where a wife owns a house or a car, but it is held in trust by the husband and or a son, and she would not openly claim ownership of the property. A woman, who does so, would be seen as disgracing her husband. And the only time the truth comes out, is when the marriage runs into difficulties and the issue of divorce comes up.

Women own property but the documents on those property are in the men’s names. Women therefore, are unable to access credit with these documents, further worsening their chances of economic freedom.

Another Akan proverb says, “the man is the woman’s honour”. Therefore, if a woman marries a man who is poor and owns no property and she on the other hand, is materially endowed, she would have to pretend that all the wealth belongs to her husband. Because it is the only way, the man could become her symbol of honour.

As a result of these strongly held beliefs, some men are known to have forcefully claimed property belonging to their wives in the event of a misunderstanding in the marriage or divorce.

This situation of property ownership according to gender, which is perpetrated through proverbs, has become the basis for gender roles in society.

The roles and responsibilities, constraints, opportunities and the needs of men and women in African societies have largely been defined and established through the oral traditions.

Proverbs as a tool for objectifying women

The use of proverbs in some African societies become the tool through which men control positions of social and economic influence by objectifying women and limiting their participations to domestic spheres. (Collins, 1996).

The ways women are objectified differ from one culture to the other, but there is one type which is widespread in Africa. In Africa, women have for a long time been used as a conduit through which men formed and solidified their relations with other men. Families enhance their wealth and alliance by giving away their female children in marriage, often against the wish of the daughters. For instance among the Somali, women served as a commodity to seal peace between feuding groups in inter-tribal warfare (Lewis, 1985).

The following proverbs portray women implicitly or explicitly as objects:

An Igbo proverb says “When a woman is getting old, it would seem as if money (bride price) was not paid to marry her.” (Oha, 1998)

This Tsonga-Shangana proverb says, “to beget a woman is to beget a man.” (Mbiti, 1988). A woman just can’t be a woman, she must be a man, in a sense if you have a daughter you can use her as an object to acquire a friend or build alliance with a prominent man.

Unfortunately, this idea of women as objects that male members of the society can use to acquire status and wealth has been largely used in advertising.

Indeed, female sexuality is used to sell almost everything including body sprays for men.

For instance, there is an advertisement for a male body spray called ‘Men Only’ running in the Ghanaian media. The billboard for this product for men has a five foot image of a woman sitting in a suggestive position.

And the TV advert for this same product depicts women as weak, unintelligent and objects of men’s ridicule and mirth.

In this advert, three women traveling in a car had one of their tyres punctured by an object. These women got down from the car, took out wheel spanners, but were confused and did not have a clue as to what to do about the problem. And across the street stood a muscular man who was laughing loudly over the women’s stupidity, and then a voice over booms, “for men only.”

The concept of women as marketing objects is so pervasive that, it has become near to impossible to market a product successfully without using the image of women.

Ironically, though, a woman, in spite of her perceived ‘weakness’, is supposed to be very hardworking. Her role as a farm-hand is crucial in the sustenance of the husband and the family. A woman is somewhat an economic asset and farm manual chores are part of her existence.

As a result, there are proverbs that shower praises on the hardworking woman and emits fiery scorn against the lazy one:
“A woman stands by the hoe”.
“The hardworking woman brings forth food; the lazy one, weed”.
“A lazy woman resents the falling rain”.
And “A hardworking woman allows you to keep a shield nearby at mealtime”.

Our own interpretation points to the well-fed man who, as a result, is always ready to go to war but generally, the ‘shield at mealtime’ is taken to be the man’s hand gesture to indicate to his wife that he is satisfied and should not be served more food. (See Walser-1984).

It should, however, be understood that the images of the woman in the above proverbs do not necessarily relate to what she is but rather what ought to be. It is basically a matter of the way she is ‘seen’ and ‘wanted’ and not the way she is. This is an illustration of culturally imposed and enhanced stereotypes that, ultimately, aim at conditioning the woman’s perception both by her self and others. (Ssetuba, 2002).

The timeliness of proverbs

Some African proverbs have become outmoded and of no use, except for their literary and historical significance, while others are for all times.

Indeed, in the face of social change, and the economic empowerment of women which to some extent have been influenced by western thought, education and democracy, proverbs laden with allusions of female subordination to males have been challenged and in most cases discarded.

There are proverbs according to Ssetuba, that articulate women’s unfitness to assume important places in society, and by implication, emphasize the necessity of their social and emotional dependence on men.

An Oromo proverb says, “women are bulky, but not great.” This proverb is an express depiction of women as inferior and therefore unable to exercise authority or occupy public office.

An Acholi proverb that “women have no chief,” is the patriarchal view that women by nature are a weak group and no woman is thus better than the other.

However, events in our world today, even in Africa shows that, this notion is changing. We currently have a female elected as president in Liberia.

Ghana's Chief Justice is a woman, the first in the history of the country. The country has created a Ministry for Women and Children.

There are women in parliament, and other women are occupying cabinet positions in government in Africa. And in most societies of the continent, the role of women have been appreciated and accepted in leadership.

There are numerous examples of successful female CEOs in industry and commerce. Women have been elected as presidents, chancellors and pro-vice chancellors of universities and colleges all over the world. Women have therefore, been accepted as employers of men and men take instructions from women in the performance of their official functions without friction.

Conclusions

The regard of proverbs as an important aspect of the literary genre of the African society is significant. It is to the extent that, proverbs permeate every aspect of the African society. While some of these proverbs have been documented by scholars, others, though, widely in use in the oral traditions of Africans are yet to be documented.

Proverbs are the foundation of social and cultural wisdom and therefore, serve as the basis for formulating concepts that govern social relations. These social relations include gender relations. But largely due to the patriarchal nature of the African society, just like most societies of the world, the subordination of women has been prominently expressed in proverbs, which has further exacerbated the disadvantaged conditions of women.

The changes in our society have affected the meanings of some proverbs with regard to the role of women in some African societies. These days, women in some African societies, who hitherto, have no right to own property, and assume leadership roles, have now taken up to such roles with ease and immense success.

The traditional stranglehold on African societies notwithstanding, the challenges confronting African thought and concepts of gender in recent times will gradually portend a shift in the ideology and give women their rightful place in the society.

World Bank Group extends suspension of $225m political risk insurance for Ghana's FPSO

2011-02-08T03:59:00.000-08:00

The saga of the suspension of a $225 million political risk insurance for the Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel that is producing oil at Ghana’s largest oil field – the Jubilee oil field does not look like it will be ending anytime soon.

The Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), a member of the World Bank Group and its partners have said they are extending the suspension of the $225 million political risk guarantee contract for the FPSO.

A brief statement posted on MIGA’s website Wednesday February 2, 2011 says “MIGA announced today it has agreed to extend for a brief period the suspension of its Contract of Guarantee for Equity Investments entered into with MV21, a subsidiary of MODEC, Inc., in relation to the Jubilee FPSO.”

The statement did not give reasons for the extension.

On Thursday July 29, 2010, MIGA published a joint statement on its website announcing the suspension of the $225 million political risk insurance for the FPSO. The statement said, “the parties agreed to this suspension in order to conduct due diligence into the conditions of a service contract between MODEC and Strategic Oil and Gas Resources (Strat Oil).”

When ghanabusinessnews.com enquired about progress of the investigation, Mallory L. Saleson Senior Communications Officer of MIGA said in an email response Monday September 27, 2010, “The process of looking into the issues is still ongoing. There is no conclusion yet.”

Meanwhile, Texas-based closely held oil company, Kosmos Energy has said the investigation of MODEC, for alleged corruption could lead to extra cost at the Jubilee oil field.

MODEC is a Japanese contractor for the FPSO facility.

Kosmos indicated in a document filed to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission January 13, 2011 that partners in the field as well as the International Finance Corp. (IFC), part of the World Bank, “are working with MODEC and its legal advisors to investigate” some “potential violations by [the contractor] under the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.”

“As a result of these concerns, MODEC’s long-term funding from a syndicate of international banks for the repayment of funds originally loaned by [Kosmos, along with partners] Tullow Oil PLC (TLW.LN) and Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (APC) for the financing of the construction of such FPSO has been suspended pending this investigation,” Kosmos said.

Kosmos said financing for the FPSO vessel–worth $875 million–used by MODEC had been suspended pending the investigation and said partners in the Jubilee field may be required to contribute further funds as a result.

The World Bank first announced in a statement in August that MIGA had entered into the $225-million-dollar 20-year contract to provide political risk insurance for the FPSO vessel on June 30, 2010.

MODEC however has said the ongoing investigation has found no evidence of wrongdoing on its part. “This investigation has found no evidence of any violation of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act or any other applicable jurisdiction’s anti-bribery laws in relation to its arrangement,” it said in a statement in January 2011.

The Ghana Country Director of the World Bank, Ishac Diwan however told ghanabusinessnews.com in December 2010 that the investigation that led to the suspension of the $225 million political risk insurance for the FPSO vessel will be completed in January 2011 and everything will normalize.

According to the latest statement from MIGA however, it doesn’t look like the investigation will end soon for everything to normalise.

Commercial production of oil however, which started in December 15, 2010 is ongoing with the first oil that was lifted already sold.

Due to time difference between the US and Ghana, ghanabusinessnews.com has been unable to contact MIGA officials for further clarification on the matter before publication.

Ivory Coast crisis: ECOWAS has eggs on face, West Africa Central Bank lies about freezing account

2011-01-19T05:01:00.000-08:00

The drama that is going on in Ivory Coast is becoming farcical, as the actors each look ridiculous and unfit for their roles.

The actor with the worst act in the drama has turned out to be ECOWAS, the West African regional grouping made up of 15 countries, some ruled by dictators and known lunatics who are hounding and killing their own citizens daily. There are even suspected murderers with no known democratic credentials parading the corridors of ECOWAS as presidents.

It was therefore, funny when ECOWAS, despite its inability to raise an army under the circumstances jumped the gun, joined the chorus of international community to order Laurent Gbagbo to step down or be removed by military force.

The ECOWAS obviously, eager to be seen to be part of the international community in condemning the situation in Ivory Coast, issued the threats against Laurent Gbagbo without any careful analysis of the issues at stake.

The other joker whose jokes fail to amuse the audience is the West African Central Bank (BCEAO). Despite joining the IMF, World Bank and others to impose economic and financial sanctions on the Gbagbo faction, the Gbagbo government is said to be drawing money from the Dakar office of the bank every day.

Allasane Ouattara, the man the international community believes is the winner of the November 28, 2010 election run-off complained to journalists in Washington in a conference call that the incumbent, Laurent Gbagbo, was still receiving central bank funds on a daily basis.

Gbagbo is still withdrawing money daily from the BCEAO, headquartered in Senegal, Dakar.

Apart from the financial muscle Gbagbo has as a result of the BCEAO’s decision to allow him access to the country’s funds, despite telling the whole world that it has frozen the accounts, Gbagbo says he can’t guarantee the safety of the millions of ECOWAS citizens in that country.

Now stuck in a quagmire, ECOWAS seems to be embarrassed with no clear answer to the political stand-off in Ivory Coast, which without any doubt is a threat to regional stability.

Right from the word go, it was possible to tell that ECOWAS has no political will to invade Ivory Coast with an army to remove Gbagbo from office. The act in itself would have been catastrophic for the people of Ivory Coast and its neighbours, particularly, Liberia and Ghana. The high number of refugees already fleeing to Liberia and the fall in business activities on border towns between Ghana and Ivory Coast are signs that portend to what could possibly have happened, as the military invasion would lead to an escalation of violence in that country.

As Ivory Coast continues on the precipice, it doesn’t appear clearly now that the international community has an answer to the political crisis. ECOWAS, by its hasty thoughtless threat has lost the moral right to mediate a peaceful resolution, so now who would intervene?

In any case, a speedy resolution of the tension in Ivory Coast is necessarily and must therefore be achieved as soon as possible to save that country from falling headlong into destruction.

It is unfortunate, however, that over 240 people have already died and some 50 are reported missing.

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

China to give $10b in loans to African countries

2010-12-23T07:23:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

China is digging its fingers deeper into the African pie. The dragon of the East is consolidating its hold on the continent by providing much needed financial assistance to countries that badly need it. And in return China is likely to have a stake in natural resources from the continent.

In a white paper on Sino-African economic and trade cooperation, released for the first time by China today December 23, 2010, the Chinese government has pledged to give African countries an amount of $10 billion in preferential loans over two years between 2010 and 2012. This amount will be given in addition to the $5 billion of preferential loans and exports buyers' credit that China provided from 2007 to 2009.

According to the paper these loans would be used to finance some major projects such as an airport in Mauritius, housing in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea and the Bui Hydropower Project in Ghana.

The paper indicates how the Chinese government views helping African countries to build houses, roads, bridges, railways, telecommunications as very important.

Meanwhile, the total number of infrastructure projects on the continent financed by China exceeded 500 by the end of 2009.

According to China's Ministry of Commerce, in 2000, China-Africa trade totaled $10 billion. It had surged to $106.8 billion by 2008.

The growth slowed down in 2009 due to the global economic downturn. But the trade volume bounced back to $61.2 billion in the first half of 2010, up 65% year on year.

Chinese investment in Africa has increased 46% over the last decade, with most projects focusing on water conservancy, electricity generation, communications and information technology.

For instance in September Ghana signed an agreement with China for a $3 billion loan to develop the country’s energy sector.

How Oando of Nigeria got the world media into ‘lap dog’ mode over Ghana gas sector deal

2010-11-11T05:13:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Oando Plc is a Nigerian oil and gas firm, which seems to have a very effective public relations (PR) outfit that has succeeded in getting the world’s media into ‘lap dog’ mode by reporting a false press statement it put out on Sunday October 4, 2009.

The media momentarily lost its watchdog stance and lapped every falsehood that Oando crafted in a well organized and purposeful press statement signed by Meka Olowola Head of Oando’s Corporate Communications unit.

As Oando intended it, the world’s media swallowed every word of the statement and gave it the obviously intended meaning. The statement was titled “Ghana selects Oando for $1bn Natural Gas Project.” And as it turned out a good number of media across the world reported that Oando has won a $1 billion deal to develop Ghana’s natural gas infrastructure.

Among the world’s leading media organisations that carried the story was the Reuters. Ghanabusinessnews.com was the first Ghanaian news source to break the story on Monday October 5, 2009.

Indeed, the Nigerian media was far more enthusiastic in reporting the news as the Nigerian Compass Newspaper published the story under the headline “Ghana Petroleum Corporation, Oando seal $1bn gas deal.”

Other Nigerian newspapers like BusinessDay and the Vanguard all carried stories with similar headlines indicating Oando has been awarded a contract.

Almost all the oil and gas sector publications around the world also carried the story which gave the impression that Oando indeed has been awarded a contract to develop Ghana’s gas infrastructure.

Unfortunately, however, the Ghana National Petroleum Coporation (GNPC) even though aware of these false impressions kept quiet. GNPC said nothing knowing the information in the media was false, and Oando also kept mute over the false information its press statement has generated around the world.

But a new development in Ghana’s gas infrastructure issue led to exposure of the facts – the facts that the Oando press release sent across a false message. That Oando has not been awarded any deal to develop Ghana’s natural gas infrastructure.

Ghanabusinessnews.com got information that the GNPC has awarded a contract to a French oil technology company, Technip to construct deepwater gas pipelines on the Jubilee project. We then contacted GNPC official Mr. Thomas Manu for confirmation of this particular project and he directed us to Mr. Victor Sunu-Attah who is the Project Coordinator for GNPC’s gas infrastructure.

He answered our initial questions and confirmed that yes; indeed, the GNPC has awarded a contract to Technip. We went further to ask how this project awarded to Technip was connected to the $1 billion deal that has been awarded to Oando of Nigeria to develop Ghana’s gas infrastructure. Mr. Sunu-Attah then asked, “Who told you we have awarded a deal to Oando to develop Ghana’s gas infrastructure?”

We said “Oando did.” He made us understand that there was no such deal. We asked further questions and he told us that Oando was involved in a selection process for the project, but that selection process was inconclusive and added that Oando did not meet the requirements for the project.

Interestingly, after ghanabusinessnews.com published the story quoting the man in charge of GNPC’s gas infrastructure, Mr. Sunu-Attah, an official of Oando called us from Nigeria and said our story was inaccurate. We insisted it was accurate, and they could send a rejoinder if they thought otherwise.

Before we had received Oando’s rejoinder on a Saturday October 30, 2010 after we had done the story on Wednesday October 27, 2010, copies of the rejoinder have already been sent to other media organisations that published it even though they did not carry the story that Oando was reacting to.

As a matter of fact peacefmonline.com published the rejoinder and claimed without any evidence that it could confirm as it was told only by Oando’s press statement that the story as reported by ghanabusinessnews.com was false. The same statement was carried by the Ghana News Agency (GNA), but the only difference with the GNA report was that Ghana Business News was edited out of the content, and any reader would not know what story Oando was referring to.

We want to set the records straight, as well as call on Oando officials to come clean on this. We at ghanabusinessnews.com since our inception despite our very limited resources have sought to do our very best to get as close as possible as we can in publishing the truth. Oando by its continuous peddling of falsehood had sought to portray ghanabusinessnews.com as rather publishing falsehood.

Indeed, we at ghanabusinessnews.com would be one of those who would have celebrated if Oando had indeed won the contract, because as a West African company, that would have been a feather in the cap of Ghana and the sub-region, but unfortunately they do not qualify to do the job as the GNPC has clearly told ghanabusinessnews.com

Ghana has just found oil, and it appears some individuals and companies might want to take advantage of the country’s perceived inexperience in the oil sector to further their own interests.

Hopefully, ghanabusinessnews.com would be on the watch for such individuals and companies and do as much as it could to expose them.

Oando must come again.

We publish below for your interest the two press statements that Oando has issued on the matter. The initial statement and the one in response to our story.

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The first press statement that generated the first story. October 5, 2009

Ghana selects Oando for $1bn Natural Gas Project

Oando, Nigeria’s leading integrated energy solutions provider announces that it has been selected as a Strategic Partner to the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) to develop assets and infrastructure to harness the gas that will be produced from the offshore Jubilee oilfield.

The oil field is rated as West Africa’s current largest offshore deepwater discovery in over a decade, with proven reserves in excess of 300 million barrels of recoverable oil and a potential for 1.8 billion barrels.

GNPC had shortlisted companies following a highly competitive bid process involving over fifty reputable local, regional and international corporations. From the initial fifty, five companies made the final selection from which Oando (Lead Developer) and Saipem (a globally renowned Oil & Gas engineering, procurement and construction firm) and Modec-Itochu (a Japanese oil & gas consortium) were chosen to form a joint consortium with GNPC.

The scope of the project includes the development of offshore and onshore high pressure gas transmission pipelines, Processing Facility, Liquefied Petroleum Gas and Condensate storage tanks, as well as other ancillary structures. The US$1 billion ultra-modern facility is planned to commence operations in the near future. The Ghanaian Government has expressed its commitment to develop a world-class infrastructure that will process natural gas as fuel for existing power plants at Effasu and Takoradi both in the Western Region of the country.

The development is also planned to enable the sale of natural gas and derivatives to both domestic and international markets. In a proactive step to eliminate gas flaring from the Jubilee Field, the completion date of the project has been scheduled to coincide with the planned First Oil for Jubilee.

This will form a model for the development of future oil and gas fields in the country. Commenting, Mr. Bolaji Osunsanya, Chief Executive Officer, Oando Gas & Power, states, “This is a testament of Oando’s high competence in the execution of gas projects and operations.

With 100 km of gas pipeline infrastructure already built in Lagos, another 128 km under construction in the South East of Nigeria and a planned 100 km yearly expansion, this new partnership with GNPC to develop Ghana’s first gas infrastructure, broadens our leadership frontiers in the gas transportation and distribution business within the West African sub-region.”

Also commenting, Mr. Wale Tinubu said, “We are very proud to be part of this historic milestone in Ghana’s oil and gas exploration. The Jubilee oilfield is set to further transform the Ghanaian economy and position the country as a key player in the Gulf of Guinea. The choice of Oando is an affirmation of our track record at project delivery and creates an opportunity for us to extend the success recorded in building Nigeria’s gas distribution pipeline system to other parts of West Africa. This is a fillip toward our drive to become the foremost energy company in sub-Saharan Africa, leveraging our tradition for execution excellence, capacity to undertake technical-intensive ventures and access to long-term financing.”

Oando is Nigeria’s leading integrated energy solutions providers with investments and subsidiaries spanning the energy entire value chain including exploration and production; upstream support; service; gas and power; international supply and trading and downstream.

For more information, please contact:

Meka Olowola
Head, Corporate Communications Oando Plc
Stallion House, 2 Ajose Adeogun Street Victoria Island, Lagos
Phone: 01 2625857 Email: nolowola@Oandoplc.com www.oandoplc.com

Oando’s response to our story exposing the falsehood in their statement. 30 October, 2010

Our attention has been drawn to a publication in the Ghana Business News which quoted Mr. Victor Sunu-Atta, an official of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), as saying GNPC never selected Oando to develop Ghana’s gas infrastructure.

We affirm that this assertion is false as Oando-SAIPEM consortium was duly selected by GNPC as a strategic partner to jointly develop the gas infrastructure project.

This selection was communicated to us via a letter dated 1st September, 2009 and signed by Mr. Thomas Manu, Director of Operations on behalf of the Managing Director of GNPC. As is typical with a development of this scale, we are currently engaging with parties to ensure an appropriate commercial, technical and transaction structure that best delivers the anticipated value of the investment.

Bolaji Osunsanya, Chief Executive Officer, Oando Gas & Power comments, “Our ability to undertake projects of this magnitude has never been in doubt. Together with our partners, we are currently on the Nigerian Gas Master Plan final shortlist of bidders for the development of the Central Processing Facilities and Strategic Gas Transmission Pipelines. With in-house capacity developed over the years; partnerships with world class technical and financial organisations; and our strict respect for the sanctity of contracts; we are in a good position to undertake the Jubilee Field Gas Infrastructure development.”

Oando remains firm in its commitment to partner with the Ghanaian Government and the GNPC in developing its energy infrastructure.

End.

For more information, please contact:

Meka Olowola Head, Corporate Communications 2, Ajose Adeogun Street,
Victoria Island, Lagos, Nigeria
molowola@oandoplc.com
Tel: +234 (1) 2702400 Ext 6376
Fax: +234 (1) 261 1366
DL: 01-2805593

Murky oil business: China, Ghana put up $5b bid for Kosmos Energy’s Jubilee stake

2010-10-23T09:24:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Ghana’s oil business is getting murkier and confusing as China’s state-owned oil producer the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) and Ghana’s state-owned oil producer, the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) are reported to have put in a $5 billion bid for Kosmos Energy’s stake in Ghana’s largest oil field, the Jubilee oil field.

Reports in the international media citing a source with knowledge of the deal say the cash bid for Kosmos’s assets and the stake in Jubilee was made about two weeks ago, but talks have seen little progress.

The sale of Texas based oil company, Kosmos Energy's stake in Jubilee has been a long running tale that seems to have no clear end, further sending confusing signals about what to expect as Ghana joins the world’s oil producers soon.

Kosmos first put up its stake in Jubilee for sale in 2009. Despite initial denials of the sale, the company was reported to have secretly opened its data room to its Texas neighbour ExxonMobil much to the consternation of the GNPC which is one of the stakeholders in the field.

Both CNOOC and ExxonMobil had earlier made $4 billion bids for the stake. It was obvious, however, that Kosmos preferred to sell to ExxonMobil while the Ghana government favours a Chinese buy. In response, the Ghana government declined approval of the ExxonMobil deal citing impropriety on the part of Kosmos Energy. Subsequently, Kosmos was subjected to investigations by the Ghana government for its conduct in the deal.

While the investigations were going on, Kosmos Energy issued a vague apology to the Ghana government – it did not say for what exactly.

In the midst of the wrangling, Kosmos Energy announced in March 2010 that it won’t sell any more. The AFP citing an unnamed official of the company reported that Kosmos Energy had rescinded its decision to sell its stake in Ghana’s Jubilee oil field.

According to the report, the official indicated that in the view of Kosmos Energy, the best option now is to stay through the production of oil from the field.

In June 2010, the government of Ghana issued a statement saying it would do‘whatever it takes within the law to protect the national interest at all times,’ in the matter of the sale of Kosmos Energy’s stake in the Jubilee oil field to ExxonMobil. This statement was issued following the completion of investigation and submission of report by the committee set up by government to investigate the Kosmos sale deal.

Even though the government said it was studying the report and would make its official position on the matter known soon, nothing has been heard since.

The latest development then raises several concerns, among which is whether indeed, there is transparency in the oil sector in Ghana and whether the government is indeed in control of the country’s nascent oil industry.

Last week, the US branch of Oxfam International announced that it was gathering 25,000 signatories online across the world to put pressure on President Obama to support tougher oil transparency in Ghana.

Meanwhile, issues of impropriety has already led to the holding of a $225 million political risk insurance for the country’s oil sector. The World Bank’s Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) together with its partners suspended the guarantee contract for the Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel that will produce and process oil and gas from the Jubilee offshore oil field in Ghana.

According to MIGA, the parties agreed to this suspension in order to conduct due diligence into the conditions of a service contract between MODEC and Strategic Oil and Gas Resources (Strat Oil).

Not long ago, the Ghana government suspended the signing of a $10 billion housing deal with Korean company, STX Group, because of a clause in the agreement which said Ghana’s yet to be produced oil should be used as collateral for loan for the project.

It appears that Ghanaians must brace themselves for more of such cloudy matters as commercial production of oil is set to begin either in November or December 2010.

Google Adsense now offers Western Union as payment option for Ghana

2010-10-08T11:26:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Google has announced a new payment system for Adsense publishers in Ghana. It is called Western Union Quick Cash payments.

Publishers are website owners or bloggers who allow Google to put up banners on their sites in a shared-revenue program. And there are about 5000 publishers in Ghana who are part of the programme.

Last week ghanabusinessnews.com carried a story announcing Google’s plans to introduce a new payments system for Ghana.

Information available to ghanabusinessnews.com says three other African countries are included in the Western Union payment system – these are Algeria, Kenya and Uganda.

“Western Union Quick Cash payments will reach you faster than checks, and they’re free of charge,” Google reportedly said.

Google also said the payments will reach Adsense subscribers faster than cheques, and at no cost to the subscriber. However, it said payments will be in local currency and will “continue to follow our normal payment schedule.”

It is however, not every subscriber who can choose this payment system. According to Google, Western Union payments can be sent only to publishers who have an individual account “at this time.”

Moreover, the payee name on your account must exactly match the government-issued ID card that can be used to cash the money the day after it has been sent.

Meanwhile, at the time of publishing this report, my Adsense account does not give me the option of selecting this new payment system, even though, I am registered as an individual.

If this new system is fully implemented, it will bring a huge relief to the many Ghanaian publishers of Google Adsense.

Africa Confidential alludes to politics over cancellation of Kosmos, ExxonMobil Jubilee oil field deal

2010-09-04T04:53:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The West is encouraging democracy, freedom of association and choice but not when it comes to other developing countries’ oil. And in the case of Ghana, both some politicians in the West and the Western media are showing how much interested they are in the country’s nascent oil industry, and so are not interested in Ghanaians making choices for themselves.

The London-based Africa Confidential is the latest to wade into the botched Kosmos Energy-ExxonMobil Jubilee deal, with an article suggesting politics behind the cancellation of the deal.

The two Texas-based oil companies had signed a secret deal in which Kosmos was selling its stake in Ghana’s largest oil field, the Jubilee field, which according to the major stakeholder, Tullow Oil contains 1.5 billion barrels of oil and has 17 wells.

The government of Ghana which is a partner in the field, saw something wrong with the deal and exercised its prerogative by refusing to endorse the secret deal, which it said was in violation of the terms of agreement binding the partners in Jubilee.

But a section of the Western media, particularly, the right-wing American media would have non of it and has been bad-mouthing Ghana for a while now. Surprisingly, the respected African Confidential has joined in the melee to seek to sully Ghana’s hard won international reputation.

Interesting development, it looks like coming in the heels of the controversial Standard and Poor’s downgrading of Ghana’s credit worthiness.

In the August 27, 2010 issue, the publication wrote “The announcement on 17 August by ExxonMobil that it is abandoning its campaign to buy a 23.5% stake in the Jubilee field, Africa’s biggest offshore oil field, is likely to precipitate a bid by the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), backed by the China Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), Africa Confidential has learned.

Although some interpret the move as another tactical victory for China against big Western oil companies, ExxonMobil’s problems are due more to Ghana politics than geopolitics.”

The government of Ghana officials have indicated that Kosmos breached the terms of agreement binding stakeholders in the Jubilee field by opening its data room to ExxonMobil. According to these officials, any one member in the partnership who intends to sell its stake must first open its data room to other members of the consortium. It is only when the member or members fail to buy or are unable to buy the stake that an outsider would be invited.

While the issue was still being discussed after the government of Ghana refused to endorse the deal between Kosmos and ExxonMobil, Kosmos reportedly apologized to the Ghana government in March. What Kosmos apologized about is still not known.

Dr. Joe Oteng-Adjei, Energy Minister told the Dow Jones Newswires on the sidelines of an oil conference, “They sat down with the president and said they were sorry.” He did not say what Kosmos was sorry for.

The allusions of Africa Confidential to political reasons is hard to tell, even though the publication dragged in the EO Group and its association with former President Kufuor.

It writes, ExxonMobil’s entreaties to Accra have dragged on since last September, when a top delegation of the company surprised President Atta Mills, then in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, by telling him its company had secured a 23.5% stake of the Jubilee field in secret negotiations with Kosmos.

This infuriated GNPC officials, at loggerheads with Kosmos. Moreover, the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) is deeply suspicious of Kosmos’s local partner, EO Group, which brought the company to Ghana and secured from it a 3.5% stake in the West Cape Three Points block (AC Vol 51 No 15).

EO’s directors, George Owusu and Kwame Bawuah-Edusei, are supporters of the opposition New Patriotic Party and close to former president John Kufuor. They stood to gain $200-300 million if Kosmos was able to sell its stake to ExxonMobil. NDC officials were convinced that a substantial part of this would find its way into the NPP’s campaign coffers before the 2012 elections.

Ghanaian officials call Kosmos’s deal with EO Group ‘the original sin’. They see the association as politically tainted and question why Kosmos was able to secure fiscal terms that were $3.8 bn. better on its West Cape Three Points field in 2004 than the terms secured a year later by its counterpart, Ireland’s Tullow Oil, on Deepwater Tano, an adjacent field of similar prospectivity, it added among other things.

While the a section of the interested parties in the West including sections of the media believe in protecting their parochial interests, the Ghana government has a responsibility to Ghanaians, and must do whatever it takes to protect that interest.

Commercial production of oil is due to begin in November or December this year, and but already it looks like for some interest groups in the West, the stakes are higher!

Will Ghana choose China over ExxonMobil for Kosmos’s Jubilee stake?

2010-08-16T10:47:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The government of Ghana about a week ago indicated in a press release that it will soon decide on the Kosmos Energy-ExxonMobil Jubilee stake issue that has become thorny over the period.

The government pledged to do ‘whatever it takes within the law to protect the national interest at all times,’ in the matter of the sale of Kosmos Energy’s stake in the Jubilee oil field to ExxonMobil.

And now there are speculations within the global oil industry that the government is likely to settle on the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) against Kosmos’ choice ExxonMobil. Indeed, government officials in the past have indicated their preference for the Chinese who have expressed interest in buying the stake.

At the height of the clamour for the stake, the Chairman of CNOOC, Fu Chengyu for the first time publicly declared in August last year that China was placing a bid for the stake.

Since Kosmos Energy put up for sale its stake in the country’s largest oil field, the Jubilee oil field which is also the largest oil field to be discovered in West Africa in the last 10 to 15 years, the field which according to Tullow Oil has about 1.5 billion barrels of oil and has 17 wells, the sales issue is yet to be resolved.

When news first broke in 2009 that Kosmos was selling its stake, the company denied the reports. The closely held Texas based company kept secret its intentions insisting the stake was not for sale. But it turned out Kosmos had opened its data room to Texas neighbours ExxonMobil much to the consternation of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Ghana’s national oil company, which is one of the stakeholders in the field.

Kosmos Energy offered to sell to ExxonMobil against the terms of the agreement binding the consortium holding stakes in the field, and the government of Ghana did not hide its displeasure with Kosmos’s action.

According to the terms of the agreement, any one member in the consortium who intends to sell its stake must first make the offer to members. It is only when members have no interest in buying or are unable to buy that outsiders would be invited to bid for the stake on sale and Kosmos has been accused of flouting the agreement by secretly making the offer to ExxonMobil.

The government subsequently, halted the deal between the Texan companies. And a section of the American media went on the offensive slamming Ghana and dragging the country’s image into the mud. There were even articles in some US media blaming President Obama for causing the halt.

But the drama must end at some point as the country begins commercial production of oil in November or December barring any other difficulty.

The government set up a committee to look into the matter. The committee has presented its report on which government will take a decision soon, and it could decide for China which has not hidden its interest in Ghana.

Relations between Ghana and China goes over 50 years and the two countries recently celebrated it. In recent times bilateral trade between Ghana and China has grown, recording in excess of $1.6 billion last year.

Chinese businesses in the country have invested in over 400 projects.

E-waste in Ghana - How many children are dying from lead poisoning?

2010-06-09T05:06:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

News this week about over hundred people including children dying from lead poisoning in Zamfara State in Nigeria raises lots of concern, and must sound the warning alarm for Ghana in the light of the e-waste dumping that goes on in the country.

According to the BBC some 163 people have died from lead poisoning and there are fears that many more are likely to die. The deaths occurred after local people started digging for gold in areas high in concentrations of lead.

Ghana has been identified as a dumping ground for electronics waste or e-waste from the UK, the USA and other European countries. Evidence uncovered by both local and international media including organizations like the Greenpeace shows that the West’s e-waste is being dumped in Ghana.

E-waste is known to contain a cocktail of poisonous chemicals that are released into the atmosphere and underground water and these chemicals contain substances like lead, mercury and arsenic.

Indeed, apart from e-waste that is brought in from outside the country, e-waste is also generated locally. Most Ghanaians have no idea what to do with their obsolete mobile phones, TV sets, sound systems, refrigerators and computers. Some simply dump these at repair shops and others onto waste dumps.

On a trip around some of Accra’s electronics items shops, one sees large numbers of obviously outmoded and unusable electronics items in store.

Lack of a national policy and or national collection points for such items make local generation of e-waste another source of concern. But what should be more worrying is the news from Nigeria that people are dying from lead poisoning.

It is not known yet if a conclusive study has been carried out in Ghana regarding lead poisoning from e-waste. But information available says some samples have been taken from some young people who work at the Agbogbogbloshie dump dismantling old electronics items and burning the cables to extract the copper for testing.

The Greenpeace had done a lab test of the soil and water at Agbogbloshie from where electronics items are dismantled and the cables put on fire to remove the copper wires. The results of the Greenpeace test showed that the soil in the area contained toxic chemicals at levels a hundred times more than allowable limits.

With these evidences, it is clear that Ghanaians are exposed to a great deal of chemical dangers from e-waste, but it appears there are no proactive efforts to stem the tide before the situation gets out of hand.

If Ghanaians are unaware of the dangers posed to human health and life, the news from Nigeria should be enough to wake the country up to the time bomb we are sitting on as unknown numbers of Ghanaians could be dying from chemical poisoning from e-waste.

In a recent email communication with the UK’s Environment Agency (EA), an official told ghanabusinessnews.com that they have concluded investigations into allegations that some recycling companies in the UK contracted to recycle e-waste have been dumping these into Ghana. The EA said they have handed the findings to their lawyers.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

UK concludes investigation of e-waste dumping in Ghana

2010-06-09T04:45:00.001-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The Environment Agency (EA) of the UK has completed an investigation into the dumping of electronics waste or e-waste into Ghana by some suspected UK recycling companies, ghanabusinessnews.com has learned.

The investigation was initiated in 2008 following media reports that some recycling companies in the UK were collecting obsolete computers meant for recycling in the UK and dumping them into Ghana.

Following email enquiries by ghanabusinessnews.com to the EA, an official, Scarlett Elworthy wrote this response, “Our officers have now completed their investigations and their findings are now with lawyers for consideration.”

But checks with Ghanaian government officials show that Ghanaian environment officials do not know about the investigation.

In a telephone interview with the Minister of Environment, Science and Technology, Ms. Sherry Ayitey, she told ghanabusinessnews.com that she is not aware of the investigation.

British media reports which led to public outcry and forced the EA to initiate the investigation discovered discarded computers from the National Health Service (NHS), and some universities which were collected by recycling firms for proper disposal dumped in Ghana, at the Agbogbloshie scrap yard in Accra.

The Independent, a UK publication also published a report based on investigations it conducted which revealed that toxic wastes from the UK continue to be dumped in Ghana and Nigeria.

The report said tonnes of toxic waste collected from British municipal dumps are being sent illegally to Africa in flagrant breach of the country’s obligation to ensure its rapidly growing mountain of defunct televisions, computers and gadgets are disposed of safely.

Hundreds of thousands of discarded items, which under British law must be dismantled or recycled by specialist contractors, are being packaged into cargo containers and shipped to countries such as Nigeria and Ghana, where they are stripped of their raw metals by young men and children working on poisoned waste dumps, the report said.

Despite mounting evidence that the UK is a regular source of the e-waste that comes to Africa, particularly Ghana and Nigeria, the UK government admitted in September 2009 that it is unable to stop the practice “because of the exponential surge in volumes of incorrectly classified waste being exported,” according to the Computer Weekly.

Some of the damaged computers found at the Agbogbloshie dump site in Accra had NHS labels on them. Other PCs were found to have been the property of UK councils and universities, including Kent County Council, Southampton County Council, Salford University and Richmond upon Thames College.

It is known that 20 to 50 million tons of e-waste are generated in the world annually and a great amount of that ends up in developing countries including Ghana and Nigeria.

Britain is responsible for around 15 per cent of the EU’s total e-waste, which is growing three times faster than any other municipal waste stream.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

Deficit is most dangerous threat to Ghana’s economy – Mahama

2010-05-10T12:45:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The vice president, John Dramani Mahama says if efforts are not made to deal with the country’s deficit, the country will be sliding down the dangerous path of economic failure of other countries like Greece, warning that the country’s deficit is the most dangerous threat to the economy.

Mahama who was speaking at the event to honour the country’s Most Respected CEO and Company over the weekend said the country has a deficit of over $1.45 billion in the petroleum sector alone.

“The Ministry of Finance has paid $550m out of this,” he said.

According to Mahama, in the non-petroleum sector, the country owes between $700 million and $1 billion.
He said the government was trying to refinance these debts, by making efforts to raise money from a consortium of banks.

In December 2009, the London-based Economic Intelligence Unit (EIU) forecast that Ghana’s deficit will narrow to 8.4% in 2010 before the country starts to earn income from oil production due to begin in June 2010. But now the production date has been moved to December.

The EIU in its Country Report on Ghana for 2009 also said Ghana’s economic policy environment will remain challenging in 2010, even though the global economic environment is expected to improve slowly after the recession in 2009.

According to the report the recent decision by the government to accept financial assistance from the IMF and the World Bank is indicative of the challenges that the government sees ahead.

The Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), John Lipsky also urged the country to reduce her budget deficit and remain firmly committed to macroeconomic stabilisation over the next two years to create prospects for investment and accelerated growth.

“Despite recent improvements, the budget deficit is still high,” Mr. Lipsky told a press conference at the end of a two-day official visit to Ghana.

Ghana’s budget deficit is projected to decline to 7.5 per cent of GDP in 2010 from 9.5 per cent.

However, Mr. Lipsky said this must be reduced further if the country was to avoid the risk of using its revenue from oil to fund the deficit instead of investing in productive sectors.

In this direction, he called for strengthening budget implementation to create fiscal space for oil production revenue to be used for poverty reduction programmes.

“Ghana has to create some space by reducing the fiscal demand on the economy,” he added.

Scanfuel wipes out settlements, farms for Jatropha plantation in Ghana

2010-02-23T06:34:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

An ominous cloud of uncertainty gathers around a Jatropha project in Ghana.

A Norwegian company, Scanfuel is operating what is currently noted to be the largest Jatropha plantation in Ghana.

The company through its Ghana subsidiary, Scanfuel Ghana Ltd., has acquired 400,000 hectares of land in the Asante Akim North Municipality of the Ashanti Region to plant Jatropha for the production of biodiesel for export.

But a visit by ghanabusinessnews.com and the International Correspondent of the European Energy Review to the farms and surrounding villages revealed an enterprise operating with impunity and disregard for local people, their way of life and local laws.

According to the Chief of Efirise, one of the settler farmer communities within the operation area of Scanfuel, Amadu Zakari, the company acquired the land from the paramount chief of Agogo, Nana Akuoku Sarpong. He added that Scanfuel subsequently offered to pay GH¢1 per acre of land to the farmers whose land it was taking over.

According to Zakari, most farmers rejected the offer because the amount was seen as paltry. Scanfuel, however is going ahead with its project, planting and harvesting the Jatropha seeds for processing and expanding by the day.

Local people are worried but scared, as they believe there are powerful hands behind Scanfuel.

Scanfuel uses heavy agric machinery to clear everything in its way including human settlements, crop farms and economic trees.

A walk around the farm revealed Dawadawa and shea trees that have been cut down. The Dawadawa tree serves as an essential food and medicinal plant for the local people. The shea tree, apart from serving as food, also has huge economic potentials for local people. The importance of the shea tree is seen in the government of Ghana’s inclusion of the shea nut in its major development programme for the northern part of the country.

The shea tree once it has survived the first five years of its early stages of germination and growth, grows slowly and takes about 30 years to reach maturity and from here, it can live for up to three hundred years and can bear fruit for two hundred years. It has food, medicinal and export value to local people.

The Municipal Chief Executive of the Asante Akim North Municipal Assembly, Thomas Osei-Bonsu in an interview told ghanabusinessnews.com that Scanfuel Ghana Ltd., is not registered with the local authority. He indicated that the entrance of Scanfuel into the area was facilitated by deceit.

“The farmers were misinformed at the beginning of the project,” he said. According to him, the farmers were told they were going to be engaged as outgrowers for Scanfuel but were not told they were going to lose their lands, but as it turned out, their arable lands have been taken away from them.

Even as political head of the area, he said “no one knows what compensation Scanfuel paid for acquiring all that land.”

All the fertile lands of the people of Efirise, Dukuse, Bamala, Brentuo, Enso Nyame ye and surrounding villages have been taken over by Scanfuel and the people are left with nothing, but fear, uncertainty and offers of jobs on the plantation at a daily wage of GH¢3.

Some local people have rejected the offer and are waiting in vain to see what will happen. Scanfuel has employed about 200 people who are currently working on the plantation.

“Scanfuel is opening itself up for litigation,” Osei-Bonsu warned.

On occasions when he had called Scanfuel officials to discuss the issues and find a solution, the company has not responded to his calls, but continues to expand, he told ghanabusinesnews.com.

Officials of Scanfuel at the company’s Agogo office declined to talk to journalists when we called on them Monday February 15, 2010.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

The Ghana biometric passport story

2010-02-10T22:25:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Uncertainty appears to surround the actual day when the first Ghanaian biometric passport will be issued. But it is certain that by the new global rules regarding types of passports that countries should have, Ghana will introduce its biometric passport this year.

A Ghanaian Times report cited the acting Director, Legal and Consular Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, McArios Akanbeanab Akanbong as saying in May 2009 that Ghana was going to issue its citizens with biometric passports in 2010.

The issuance of the passport is a requirement for the country to meet the International Civil Aviation Organisation’s (ICAO) deadline for member states to provide their nationals with such a document to avoid being denied entry into member countries of ICAO.

According to the report, Mr. Akanbong indicated that without a biometric passport, Ghanaians travelling outside risked being denied entry as their data would not be at the Biometric Centre for immigration officers at international airports to crosscheck their details.

A biometric passport has features like electronic chip into which has been processed, the thumbprint of holders and kept at a biometric centre. It has a holographic foil, watermark paper, invisible and visible foil and digital photographs of holders are used.

In January 2010, the GNA reported that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will launch the country’s biometric passport on February 3, 2010. The report said in preparation to the launch, Regional Immigration Commanders and Information Service Officers were trained.

The biometric passport is expected to have some benefits to the country. According to Mr Akanbong, these would include elimination of middlemen in the application and acquisition of passports and the avoidance of situations where individuals manipulate the system and acquire multi-passports.

“No middleman can acquire a biometric passport for anyone because with this system, the applicant has to be available for his or her thumbprint to be taken for data and identification purposes before the passport is issued,” he said.

But just when Ghanaians were psyched up for the biometric passport, a Daily Graphic reports put a spanner in the works. The issuance of the biometric passport has been put on hold.

The Daily Graphic reports says the Passports Office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration says its plan to begin the issuance of biometric passports to Ghanaians has been put on hold until the heavy backlog of passports applications currently at the office has been cleared.

It has, therefore, set March 23, 2010, as the new date to begin the sale of new forms for the biometric passports.

The period will also be used to replace all hand-written passports being held by Ghanaians abroad with appropriate booklets, the report added.

But while all these were going on, Ghanaians were told not to panic. A Ghanaian Times report citing Madam Bernice Benneh, the Director of Passports said there is no need to panic because “there will be a five-year interface period for the current passports to be phased out.”

She reportedly assured Ghanaian travelers that they will not encounter any difficulties with the introduction of the biometric passports as passports currently in circulation will remain valid until 2015.

Meanwhile, passport forms are unavailable at designated points. The designated points for acquiring passport forms are the post offices and all branches of Ecobank, but forms are unavailable. This development has left many Ghanaians whose passports are expired or are expiring this month in limbo as they have no information on what to do.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

The speech I gave at the official launch of ghanabusinessnews.com

2009-12-16T02:37:00.000-08:00

Mr. Chairman, Special Guest of Honour, distinguished ladies and gentlemen, today marks a defining moment in the media landscape of Ghana – the medium we are launching today, ghanabusinessnews.com is a pacesetter in new media or online journalism.

Even though the site has been in operation only for a year, it has made such remarkable impacts that its visitor profile keeps growing everyday.

But that’s not the whole story. Indeed, starting any business in Ghana is like starting a war. While, the usual response one gets is the “no one has done it before and succeeded” remark, you are also likely to have some people dedicate time, energy and resources to work at ensuring that you do not succeed. Only few indeed wish you well, and go beyond the wishes to give you a hand.

To be set for success therefore, one must be prepared to take a firm posture and be prepared to fight on at any cost. The media business terrain is indeed not for the faint-hearted.

In as much as these are worrying – especially when you are starting a news medium – what is more disturbing is the present media landscape one has to operate in Ghana today.

Journalism has long been held as the Fourth Estate of the Realm because of its prestigious position and importance to the good of the wider society. But activities of some of our colleagues have slipped this dignified institution into disrepute and scorn.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, permit me to draw your mind back to some unfortunate events in our not too distant history.

Some 20 years ago, to be a journalist in Ghana was a criminal endeavour just like being labeled a terrorist today in some parts of the world. Only few journalists dared to be critical. The situation was so bad that draconian newspaper laws were passed targeting specific journalists and media. This made it impossible to practice the kind of critical journalism that promotes a progressive, pluralistic society.

Some of the country’s journalists had to go in and out of prison for merely writing the news. There were some casualties. John Kugblenu, of the Free Press, and the newspaper publisher, Tommy Thompson were among the losses of this tyranny. These two gallant men stood up to the tyranny of the era, but they paid the ultimate price for serving society to the best of their abilities. They will always be remembered.

Against this background, it becomes unacceptable to have the kind of journalism that the good people of this country are being subjected to these days.

Journalism in Ghana appears to have been reduced to a pedestrian vocation that is open for mass participation as though there are no rules or values guiding the practice.

We all know for a fact that the general quality and depth of journalism in Ghana today leaves much to be desired.

It is evident that not only have charlatans and pretenders, with the unflinching backing of their sponsors, found it easy to hijack the noble profession for their own parochial interests, but they have also succeeded in carving a certain image for the profession. This has effectively distorted the true image of journalism in the country.

Indeed, a number of studies have shown that the media in Ghana is covering mostly what is not news at all, but ordinary everyday gossip; publishing stories in a manner that defies journalistic principles.

A recent study published by the Ghana Anti-Corruption Coalition which was done by Dr. Audrey Gadzekpo of the School of Communication Studies, Legon, shows that important news and information receive very little coverage, and where they are covered they are buried somewhere in the inside pages.

Indeed, the study also found that stories that should have made the headlines were given poor treatment; with most of the stories being one sided. Another indictment on Ghanaian journalism as found by this particular study is the fact that most stories lack in-depth analysis.

At the height of this rather unacceptable situation is the blatant abuse of the copyright laws of Ghana and intellectual property rights of others, even by so called leading media organizations.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, the copyright laws of Ghana and international conventions make it explicitly clear on how to use intellectual works of others. In using the works of others, the least one could do is at least to attribute or credit the sources. But some journalists in Ghana deliberately copy material from other sources and put these up as their own. I have had occasion to raise issues on this subject right here in this hall some few months ago, but the situation since then has not changed – it has worsened.

The challenges are not only internal, there are also external factors that stand in the way of practitioners. A typical example is the refusal of public officials to provide very simple and basic information for news and analysis.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, I had to quit my job with a good pay packet by Ghanaian standards to set up ghanabusinessnews.com. I did this because at one point, I was told that if I wanted to do professional journalism I should go and establish my own medium. Well, here I come!

I did not start ghanabusinessnews.com because it is fun; I had to invest literally what was my life’s savings, and indeed modify my lifestyle in great detail to be able to manage the website over the last couple of months.

I did this, motivated by the conviction that Ghana deserves better, and so if I have what it takes to give this great country what it deserves in line with a profession I have lived my life for in the last 20 years, well why not?

More importantly, with ICT and the World Wide Web becoming the technology of the century I was even far more convinced that by getting into online journalism, at least I could attempt in my own little way to give the Ghanaian media a good face globally as well as promote businesses and good journalistic practice the best way possible.

I am not surprised therefore, that in this short period ghanabusinessnews.com, which we are launching today has become the number one business news source on Ghana according to rankings by the world’s number one search engine, Google.

For instance, if you type the words, “Ghana business news” in Google search engine, out of 24.5 million results, ghanabusinessnews.com appears as the first two pages. This is a good start ladies and gentlemen!

I want to thank the organizations and some of the individuals who have made this event possible.

I am grateful to the World Bank, Ghana Country office for the encouragement and support. I thank Accra Brewery Ltd., for providing the drinks to refresh us all and Voltic Ghana Ltd., also for refreshing us with water.

I also want to thank the distinguished chairman of the event, Prof. Kofi Oduro-Afriyie, Mr. Affail Monney, for standing on for Mr. Ransford Tetteh who couldn’t make it as planned for some very good reasons. I am also thankful to Mr. Bright Blewu for his encouragement and support in making this programmes a reality.

Ladies and Gentlemen: At ghanabusinessnews.com, our goal is to practice journalism of the best quality that can match international standards. But above all fulfill the primary mission of the profession – to serve the public interest and do good to all persons and groups.

Thank you all for coming and God bless you.

One year of ghanabusinessnews.com

2009-11-30T23:05:00.000-08:00

On December 6, 2008 a Ghanaian journalist, Emmanuel K. Dogbevi started the first online business news source on Ghana, ghanabusinessnews.com. And come December 2009, the site will be one year old.

Mr. Dogbevi, an award winning journalist who also writes business plans found the need for a business news website following disappointing experiences in finding valuable and relevant information on businesses in Ghana. This disappointment led to the development of the website to meet the growing need for high quality business news and information on Ghana.

An experienced journalist himself with a background in web development and online journalism he took off hoping to grow the site into a viable business within two years. But within its first year since going online, ghanabusinessnews.com has become the business news source of choice on Ghana all over the world.

The website covers general news, investment, ICT news, tourism, insurance, politics, sports and entertainment. It also has pages for editorials/opinion, feature articles and news from Africa and other parts of the world.

Apart from generating content, the website is also an aggregator of news and information from other sources.

“The entrance of ghanabusinessnews.com into the online media scene in Ghana has certainly raised the stakes higher, because the news and information that we put up meet the highest standards in journalism anywhere,” Emmanuel K. Dogbevi, who is also the Managing Online Editor of the site said.

“The website is barely one year old and yet we have received overwhelming feedback from all over the world. We have once received a phone call from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, an enquiry from a unit of the United Nations and commendation letters from some individuals we do not even know both in Ghana and abroad. And for us, these are indicators that we are meeting the needs of the global online news market,” he said.

“This worldwide recognition also places on us a greater responsibility to do more, and we do hope to live up to expectations as we pursue the highest professional standards possible in meeting the needs of our visitors,” he added.

For more information, contact:

Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Email: info@ghanabusinessnews.com

Tel: 233-244 699845.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Mobile phone users in Ghana to reach 15 million by end of 2009 - Report

2009-10-19T23:54:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The number of Ghanaians using mobile phones is expected to reach 15 million by the end of 2009, the fourth quarter report on Ghana’s mobile phone market by London headquartered Business Monitor International (BMI) has said.

The report which was released last week indicated that the country’s mobile penetration is expected to “reach 60% penetration before the end of 2009. This will mean that it ends the year with close to 15 million mobile subscribers, which indicates a 27% expansion of the subscriber base during 2009. This is down from 57% in 2008, but this is very much a natural evolution thanks to a gradually maturing mobile market.”

It was however unhappy with the level of revenue earnings of some of the providers. The report said more worrying are Ghana’s (Average Revenue Per Users) ARPUs, which took something of a dive in the first quarter of 2009. This is a pattern that has been seen in many markets across Africa, exemplified by pan-African operator MTN’s results. ARPUs is how much the mobile phone companies make per each subscriber per month.

The report said MTN’s abridged results released during the period show that in every single one of the markets it operates in, ARPUs have gone down, some of them really dramatically.

According to the report a certain amount of this decrease is down to devalued currencies against the dollar, and the rest is due to decreased spending on the home market. In Ghana’s case, MTN’s blended ARPU fell from US$12 in fourth quarter 2008 to US$8 in first quarter 2009. This 31% drop in US dollar terms, however, was backed up by a 15% drop in local currency terms, so there is evidence that mobile spending did noticeably drop as people started to feel the effects of economic concerns.

It is however hard to determine which statistics to believe as there are different figures being published on Ghana’s mobile penetration.

A recent report carried by the Ghana News Agency (GNA) citing documents in its possession say they reveal disparities in the number of active mobile phone subscriptions in the country.

It said according to the National Communications Authority (NCA), its first quarter report for 2009, placed wireless penetration at 55% of the 24 million Ghanaian mobile telephony market.

The GNA also pointed to information on Millicom Ghana’ website, www.millicom.com, which says that wireless penetration in Ghana was 47%, citing interconnectivity activities between operators as its “authentic” source of information. Millicom Ghana is the operator of Tigo.

Other commentators believe that, the inefficient manner in which the NCA computes these figures is the source of the disparities. Despite the conflicting figures however, there is evidence that the mobile phone industry in Ghana is growing. With the eminent presence of Globacom in the country, there is optimism that the mobile market in Ghana would become even more exciting.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

Nearly 400 million Africans have mobile phones - Report

2009-09-19T00:32:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Africa’s mobile phone industry is seeing phenomenal growth despite the ripples of the global economic crisis.

The continent’s mobile phone market has grown up to 25% in 2008, a study conducted by Blycroft Publishing, a UK-based telecommunications publisher with a focus on mobile markets has found.

The report published Thursday September 17, 2009 in London says the mobile phone sector on the continent has seen the activation of 74 million new subscribers.

The report noted that at the end of March 2008 the African mobile market stood at 296 million subscribers.

“During 2008 the market grew by more than 74 million subscribers reaching 370 million mobile subscribers as of the fourth quarter of 2008, representing a remarkable 25% increase in the size of the market,” it said.

Some of the factors that contributed to this growth, the study found, included the launch of 11 new networks in Ghana, Benin, Botswana, Congo Brazzaville, Guinea-Conakry, Kenya, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sudan and Uganda.

In Ghana the newest network, Zain was launched in December 2008 and Orange launched both in Niger and Uganda.

Other factors attributed to the growth are most likely economic growth and proliferation of networks within Africa.

The report also indicated that as of May there were 163 mobile networks live across Africa spanning both GSM and CDMA technologies.

Meanwhile, in Ghana, there is a debate over the exact percentage of the country’s population actually using mobile phones.

While the National Communications Authority (NCA) says it is 55%, which accounts for some 12.1 million of Ghana’s about 22 million population, the figure was recently disputed by an official of Tigo. A GNA report quoted Ms. Lucy Quist, Tigo’s Head of Operations for Africa as saying the current wireless penetration in Ghana is 47%, which puts the figure at 10.34 million of the population.

In an interview however, CEO of Kasapa Telecom, Mr. Bob Palitz told ghanabusinessnews.com that it is difficult to tell the exact number of mobile phone users in Ghana. He said there is a difference between the number of chips that people have bought and the actual number of people who are actively using their mobile phones.

He argues that there are people who have more than one mobile phone chip from different networks and might not necessarily be using all of them.

He told ghanabusinessnews.com that the methodology of counting is problematic. He said, the counting is done every three months and within that three months, it is possible that a customer of one network could leave and connect to another network, and all the networks would count this subscriber. “This leads to duplication,” he said.

In spite of the conflicting figures, there is certainly growth in the mobile phone industry in Africa and for that matter Ghana, and there is evidence that it is driving economies and leading to growth.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Ghana's Information Minister shows up on Facebook

2009-09-02T02:51:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Believe it or not, Ghana’s Minister of Information is now on Facebook, the most successful social networking site so far.

Facebook was started about five years ago by a young man, Mark Zuckerberg with college students in mind. But in the five years since it started, the site has gained over 250 million users, and cuts across all groups. Someone had said elsewhere that if it was a country, Facebook would have been the third most populated country in the world!

While it does not release its earnings, a recent stock buy-out option valued the site around $6.5 billion.

The Ministry announced her presence in a press statement released in Accra Tuesday September 1, 2009.

According to the release the Minister, Zita Okaikoi announced that she will be available for two hours every week to interact and answer questions on her Facebook page.

It added that the two deputies at the Ministry, James Agyenim-Boateng and Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa would also at different times be online to interact.

The news is immediately heartwarming and encouraging. It is encouraging in the sense that government machinery is waking up, albeit a bit late to the realities of the times. Despite an ambitious and forward looking ICT development agenda, government has consistently paid lip service to the actual implementation of ICT led programmes to bring about real transformation.

It is instructive to say however, that the ICT revolution taking place in Ghana currently is increasingly led by the private sector and individual initiatives.

A professor of computer science Prof. Clement Dzidonu had warned that Ghana as a country cannot make much progress by merely promoting Information Communication Technology (ICT).

He said, “ICT per se will not solve our problems, you need other resources like power and so on to make use of ICT. Buying electronics gadget without using them to solve your problems is a double loss.”

Prof. Dzidonu, who is also the President of Accra Institute of Technology, argues that while there is growing awareness of ICT in Ghana, the country is still at what he calls “the preliminary stages” of ICT. He said the country has not got to the stage where it could use ICT to transform the society and economy. That is the challenge the country is facing.

While the move by the Information Ministry is in the right direction, it is hard to see how the Ministry which has persistently performed one of its primary duties of media accreditation at below any standards elsewhere, could successfully use new media to effectively and efficiently engage the public.

Again it is curious to see how the Ministry which has an entrenched image as propaganda wing of government, would succeed in the virtual world of the World Wide Web.

Scientist warns against global rush into biofuel cultivation

2009-08-27T05:16:00.001-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

A US scientist, Thomas R. Sinclair has warned countries that are rushing into cultivating biofuels in their efforts to reduce dependence on fossil fuels to take into consideration the multiple limits to plant production on earth.

In an article titled “Taking Measure of Biofuel Limits” published in the “American Scientist,” the magazine of Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society, he said, “before nations pin big hopes on biofuels, they must face some stark realities, however. Crop physiology research has documented multiple limits to plant production on Earth. To ramp up biofuel crop production, growers must adapt to those limits or find ways around them.”

Professor Sinclair who is a visiting professor in agronomy at the University of Florida and an adjunct professor in crop science at North Carolina State University was also raised on a farm in Indiana.

He writes “in a justified rush to cut fossil fuel consumption, some nations are embracing biofuels as a petroleum alternative at the gas pump. Using sugarcane, Brazil already produces 24.5 billion liters of ethanol a year to fuel car and truck engines.”

“In the United States, annual ethanol production has reached 40 billion liters, or 10 billion gallons. The U.S. Energy Independence and Security Act calls for 144 billion liters of ethanol per year in the U.S. transportation fuel pool by 2022. That equals 25 percent of U.S. gasoline consumption today. No more than about 40 percent is to be produced with maize, an important food and export crop. Non-grain feedstock is supposed to supply the rest,” he added.

In Professor Sinclair’s view there are no means by which humans could bypass the limits of crop production, arguing that “such advances may not be as simple as some predict. Plants and their evolutionary ancestors had hundreds of millions of years to optimize their biological machinery. If further improvements were easy, they would probably already exist.”

He insists that no matter what techniques are developed to expand biofuel feedstock, some basic physical and physiological limitations will still apply.

“Plants cannot be grown without three crucial resource inputs: light, water and nitrogen. Each of those inputs will be needed in substantial quantities, yet their availability in the field is limited. As important, so far plants make use of those resources only at established rates,” he says.

He further states that no matter what techniques are developed to expand biofuel feedstock, plants cannot be grown without three crucial resource inputs: light, water and nitrogen. Each of those inputs will be needed in substantial quantities, yet their availability in the field is limited. As important, so far plants make use of those resources only at established rates. In fact, the close relationship between the available amounts of these resources and the amount of plant mass they can produce—not human demand—will determine how much biofuel the world can produce.

Citing the US as an example he writes, “light, water and nitrogen will be essential for growing biofuel feedstocks. The availability of these resources will be critical to achieving ethanol production goals set by the U.S. Energy and Security Act. Even if the current increase in maize yield can be sustained at 0.1 tonne per hectare per year, the equivalent of 40 percent of today’s U.S. maize crop will be required for ethanol production while other domestic and export demands for maize also must be met.”

Professor Sinclair is emphatic that identifying land area for cellulosic plant production will be even more challenging. Depending on the efficiency of ethanol production from cellulosic feedstock, somewhere between 25 and 50 million hectares of new land must be brought into high and sustainable agricultural production to achieve the required yields.

“Since this land-use conversion would need to take place roughly over a decade, it would be the most extensive and rapid land transformation in U.S. history,” he says.

To complicate matters, land used for cellulosic feedstock must be in regions with sufficient rainfall to achieve needed yields. The amount of water transpired by those crops could be large enough to influence the hydrologic balance of farming regions. An unanswered question is whether stream and aquifer flows from these areas would also remain adequate to meet all local freshwater needs, he writes.

Professor Sinclair’s arguments obviously are worth looking at by biofuel advocates. Besides, it also calls for a critical and objective look in view of the fact that biofuels are competing for scarce land for food cultivation in the face of a global food crisis.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

Another major Jatropha project suffers setback

2009-07-29T11:43:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Another Jatropha biofuel project initiated by D1 Oils Plc has suffered a jolt as a major investor pulls out.

Reports reaching ghanabusinessnews.com from the US say, Europe’s second largest oil company BP Plc intends to exit its Jatropha biofuel project with D1 Oils Plc. BP, according to the reports is exiting the Jatropha project to focus on ethanol production in Brazil and the US and also to advance biobutanol development.

As a result of BP’s withdrawal, D1 agreed to acquire its 50% interest in their joint venture D1-BP Fuel Crops Ltd. venture which was set up in June 2007 to develop Jatropha. Jatropha is a drought-resistant tree whose seeds contain oil that can be used in biodiesel production.

The deal came to an end when the two companies failed to get a third investor for the project. The two began talking about dissolving the venture this year and bringing planting and plant-science operations under D1’s control.

BP and D1 had planned to plant 1 million hectares of Jatropha over four years, of which 220,000 hectares had been planted by April.

BP Alternative Energy earmarked $8 billion for the project investment in the decade through 2015. BP, which expects biofuels to account for 11 percent to 19 percent of the world’s transport-fuel market by 2030, supplied about 10 percent of global biofuels last year, according to company estimates.

London-based D1 however said it would be able to maintain the business at lower cost until market conditions allowed the injection of new capital.

This is the second time D1’s investments in Jatropha to produce biofuels has not gone well.

An ambitious Jatropha project in India involving 22 agribusiness colleges failed to yield projected targets, leading to disappointments and disillusionment.

The argument has been made that Jatropha would grow on wasteland or marginal land, but Indian researcher, Dr Suman Jha who worked on the D1 project disagrees. He says, “this is not a wasteland crop. It needs fertiliser, water and good management. Yes, it grows on wasteland, but it doesn’t give you any yield.”

D1 Oils planted about 257,000 hectares of Jatropha, mainly in India but it was unsuccessful and the company was compelled to move far too early.

For instance in 2006 D1 aimed to produce 2.7 tonnes of oil per hectare from areas planted with its new E1 variety, and 1.7 tonnes of oil from normal seed. That is equivalent to about 8 tonnes and 5 tonnes of seed per hectare respectively, or 3.5kg and 2kg a plant. But according to Pradip Bhar, who runs the company’s D1 Williamson Magor Bio Fuel joint venture in India’s north east, admits he has yet to achieve a fraction of that.

“Hitting 500g is the challenge,” he says. “Mortality is quite high. But if we can reach 500g in two years’ time, after that the bush will continue to grow. Our expectation is that after the fourth year we will hit 1kg. The 1.5kg mark we haven’t touched as yet.”

There has been consensus that the Indian experiment had been unsuccessful.

Meanwhile, in Ghana some biofuels companies who have announced investments in Jatropha to produce biofuels have been making projections that are yet to be seen.

Gold Star Farms Ltd. claims it intends to cultivate five million acres of land to plant Jatropha for the production of biofuels for export.

One of the company’s executives, Mr. Jack Holden has said that it has commitments from farmers to grow the crop on approximately five million acres of land in Ghana.

The company, he added, plans to begin producing biodiesel at its facility in Nkawkaw, in the Eastern region of Ghana, in 2009. It is July 2009, and it is not yet known if the company has produced its first litre of biofuel from Jatropha.

Another biodiesel company, Green Fuels Biodiesel which revived silos abandoned in Ghana for 43 years for its operations recently said it is investing in the multi-million cedi project to produce biodiesel from Jatropha seeds later in the year.

The Managing Director of Green Fuels, Mr. Joseph Karam, told the Daily Graphic newspaper that the initiative would contribute significantly towards reducing the importation of biodiesel and grease into the country.

According to him, “there is the potential to produce quality biodiesel from Jatropha, instead of spending huge sums of money to import these products, we can produce them here.”

He said 500,000 litres of biodiesel would be produced a day for the local market.

There is certainly a potential for Jatropha as a biodiesel source, but why it is recording failures rather than successes needs to be critically looked into.

There is need for sober reflections and investments in R&D to determine the full potentials of Jatropha as a viable, cost-effective and efficient non-food crop for biofuels.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Is the UK serious about halting e-waste dumping in Ghana?

2009-07-20T02:23:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The British colonized Ghana for many years, and succeeded in building their economy with Ghana’s natural and human resources. But now they have turned Ghana into a dumping ground for their out of use electronics equipment.

It is known that electronics waste or e-waste contains a dangerous cocktail of poisonous chemicals that pose grave dangers to human life and the environment.

It is therefore, hard to understand why citizens of an advanced country, with all the wealth and resources to handle the e-waste that they have generated instead chose a poor and struggling country like Ghana to dump.

There is now overwhelming evidence that the UK has turned Ghana into a dumping ground for its e-waste. Earlier investigations by British journalists found damaged computers at the Agbogbloshie dump site in Accra with labels of the National Health Service (NHS). Some other computers with NHS labels were also found to be on sale at secondhand electronics equipment dealers’ shops in Ghana’s capital Accra.

Some PCs were also found to have come from UK local councils and universities, including Kent County Council, Southampton County Council, Salford University and Richmond upon Thames College (RUTC) and recently, a Ministry of Defence computer has been found.

On February 18, 2009 authorities in the UK arrested a man over the export of e-waste into developing countries. The 46-year-old man was not named but he was identified as from West Sussex. The countries he was exporting the e-waste to were never mentioned, and he was released on bail until May 5, 2009. Nothing is known yet about his prosecution.

The Independent, a UK newspaper did a report based on investigations it has conducted which revealed that despite ongoing investigations in the matter, toxic wastes from the UK continue to be dumped in Ghana and Nigeria.

The report says tonnes of toxic waste collected from British municipal dumps are being sent illegally to Africa in flagrant breach of the country’s obligation to ensure its rapidly growing mountain of defunct televisions, computers and gadgets are disposed of safely.

Hundreds of thousands of discarded items, which under British law must be dismantled or recycled by specialist contractors, are being packaged into cargo containers and shipped to countries such as Nigeria and Ghana, where they are stripped of their raw metals by young men and children working on poisoned waste dumps, the report said.

According to The Independent, in a joint investigation it carried out together with Sky News, and Greenpeace, they found that a television set that had been broken beyond repair was tracked to an electronics market in Lagos, Nigeria, after being left at a civic amenity site in Basingstoke run by Hampshire Country Council.

The publication remarked that under environmental protection laws of the UK, the TV set was classified as hazardous waste and should never have left the country.

In the face of these evidences, the UK Environment Agency (EA) initiated investigations into the matter. In personal correspondence I have hard with the EA in October 2008, The Senior Press Officer responsible for environment protection, Scarlett Elworthy admitted to me by email that the EA was investigating the incidents of e-waste dumping into Ghana. She promised, “I will be happy to provide you with an update once the investigation has concluded.”

It appears while the investigation has been ongoing since last year, the dumping continues. While it does, I have made persistent enquiries at the UK Agency, but have received no information as they keep telling me their investigation team is still investigating the matter.

If the UK authorities fail to act to stop their citizens who obviously are doing these together with some Ghanaians, our Ghanaian authorities should act.

The situation of e-waste in Ghana is grave – as human life and the environment are endangered.

After Obama's Ghana visit, would American investors come?

2009-07-14T01:54:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

President Barack Obama left Ghana Saturday night July 11, 2009, but the ripples of his visit still reverberate throughout the country and indeed the entire world. But one question that lingers on our minds at ghanabusinessnews.com is: would the historic visit serve as an encouragement to American investors to come to Ghana?

Available data shows that US businesses are not investing as much as they should generally in Africa and in Ghana in particular. A study that was published on May 20, 2009 by the US Chamber of Commerce says American businesses are not encouraged to invest in Africa for reasons among which are corruption, lawlessness, unstable governments and inadequate infrastructure.

Indeed, in President Obama’s speech to Ghana’s Parliament Saturday July 11, 2009, he specifically touched on the issues of corruption as a bane to development not only in Ghana, but the entire continent. He said: “Repression takes many forms, and too many nations are plagued by problems that condemn their people to poverty. No country is going to create wealth if its leaders exploit the economy to enrich themselves, or police can be bought off by drug traffickers.”

Adding, “no business wants to invest in a place where the government skims 20 percent off the top, or the head of the port authority is corrupt. No person wants to live in a society where the rule of law gives way to the rule of brutality and bribery. That is not democracy, that is tyranny, and now is the time for it to end.”

As a matter of fact, several studies conducted in Ghana by anti-corruption institutions over the years show the police as corrupt. The political institution has also been cited in surveys as being corrupt. Political corruption in Ghana has even been nicknamed “kickbacks”.

Another study published by the Bank of Ghana on foreign direct equity investments in Ghana also shows that Europe and not America is the leading investor in the country.

The highlights of the survey, shows Europe as making the highest foreign direct equity investments (FDEI) to Ghana representing 60.7%., while investments from the African continent consist of 38.0%.

America places fifth among the top ten investor nations in Ghana. According to the report, the top ten sources of FDEI inflows in 2007 were Mauritius, 27.9%; France 19.4%; British Virgin Islands 18.4%); United Kingdom 16.9%; United States 5.9%; Togo 3.4%; Norway 3.3%; Israel 3.2%; Nigeria 2.1%, and Switzerland 1.9%.

The US Chamber of Commerce study is titled ‘The conversation behind closed doors: Inside the Boardroom: How Corporate America Really views Africa’.

The Chamber is also the world’s largest business federation with a membership of more than three million businesses and organizations of every size, sector and region as well as 112 affiliates in 99 countries around the world, making the Chamber a crucial source of investment in any country.

Despite the enthusiasm and hope that heralded the institution of the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) on May 18, 2000 to offer “tangible incentives” for African countries to open their economies and build free markets, not many American businesses as expected are doing business in Ghana.

To the extent that reports indicate that Ghana’s exports to the US under the AGOA fell in 2008 and continued to fall into the first quarter of 2009.

Ghana’s total exports under AGOA to the US market stood at US$42.2 million in 2008, a 38.4 percent decline from the US$68.6 million recorded in 2007.

From January to March this year, the country’s total value exported under the scheme was US$2.5 million, representing a momentous 86 percent decline over the US$18.1 million recorded in the first quarter of 2008.

The US Chamber of Commerce cited some of the following reasons for not investing in Africa; the image of lawlessness, corruption, unstable governments, an inadequate infrastructure, uneducated or untrained people, and an unwelcoming government attitude toward business.

Hopefully, President Obama’s visit to Ghana, which he clearly said was his endorsement of the country’s democratic culture and stability, would change the perception and spur some more US businesses to enter Ghana and invest.

These businesses would be joining other major US investors like Coca-Cola, Newmont Mining, Lehman Brothers, CMS Energy and Cargill.

American investors can look at the following areas; aerospace/defense, agribusiness, consumer goods, health care and information and communications technology.

The others could be infrastructure, media, petrochemical/extractive, pharmaceutical and transportation.

Tema Oil Refinery to go into biofuels production

2009-07-06T14:16:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Ghana’s only oil refinery, the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) intends to go into the production of biofuels in the next 18 months, in anticipation of the phasing out of conventional oil, its acting Managing Director has said, according to a GNA report.

Dr Kwame Ampofo, then stressed on the importance for African refiners to shift their focus from conventional fuels to biofuels so that they will be in a better position to satisfy the international market.

He argued that other countries are gradually focusing on biofuel, making it important for African refiners to go into its production. “It is renewable and regenerates itself,” he said.

Dr. Ampofo said these Thursday July 2, 2009 when he addressed the opening of a two-day meeting of heads of laboratories of oil refineries in Africa in Accra.

The meeting was organized by the Africa Refiners Association (ARA) in collaboration with TOR for 45 participants in the refineries from 10 African countries including Ghana.

The meeting, which is a follow up to a previous one held in Dakar, is aimed at reviewing discussions and mapping up strategies for the way forward.

Dr Ampofo warned that should African refineries fail to go into the production of biofuels they would lose their relevance when the use of conventional fuel finally fades out.

He said plans were underway to integrate TOR into the production of biofuels and that even though TOR has the staff to go into the production it would be fully ready to do so within 18 months.

Dr Ampofo said most economies would be consuming up to 50 percent of energy generated from petroleum in the next decade and the proper management of the sector would determine the future of the economy and appealed to refineries to come out with quality products to meet modern standards.

The global food and economic crisis, coupled with the global energy crisis is pushing most countries into considering alternative energy sources as the way out. Biofuels have been identified as the most appropriate alternative energy sources, but not without the attendant challenges that these pose.

For instance, the Guardian newspaper in London in July 2008 published a leaked World Bank report which says biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75% – far more than previously estimated. Indeed, the report was a sharp contradiction of the US government’s claims that biofuel contributes less than 3% to the food crisis.

In May 2008, the UN’s top adviser on food security, Olivier de Schutter made a scathing criticism against the investments that are being made in biofuels by some countries. In an interview with the BBC, he described the investment in biofuels as “irresponsible”, but his predecessor in the job, Jean Ziegler, had condemned biofuels as a “crime against humanity” and called for an immediate ban on their use. He went ahead to call for an immediate freeze of the policy and asked for restraint on investors whose speculation he says is driving food prices higher.

The World Bank report, however, pointed out that biofuels derived from sugarcane, which Brazil specializes in, have not had any dramatic impact on food prices.

The IMF Country Director in Ghana, Arnold McIntyre, had said at a World Bank Dialogue Series in Accra, Ghana, that countries are turning to biofuels in response to current global fuel crisis, adding that by 2005, the US overtook Brazil as the largest producer of ethanol. In the EU, he said, Germany is the largest producer of biofuel.

He added that, biofuel production in the US which is corn based, is less cost effective than the sugarcane based in Brazil. He therefore, called for policy change to address biofuels production and suggested that it is necessary to do more research in second generation biofuels production.

Currently, in Ghana over twenty companies say they are investing in biofuels, some are into the cultivation of Jatropha. But available evidence suggests that not much is known about the full potential of Jatropha as an alternative energy source. Indeed, the experience of India has shown that the crop does not yield as much as it has been said to.

The government of India announced a scheme to plant 13 million hectares, enough to generate nearly 500,000 barrels of Jatropha oil per day.

But as the country’s major investment in Jatropha neared its end, it was discovered that there was no yield. “While the literature said that with dry land, after four years’ growth, you can get a yield of 1kg per plant. For us, it is hardly 200g per plant,” said Professor R. R. Shah, Navsari Agricultural University’s dean of agribusiness, one of the 22 agribusiness colleges involved in the Indian project

D1 Oils, a London-listed biofuels company also planted about 257,000 hectares of Jatropha mainly in India, but it was unsuccessful.

The current global energy crisis makes the temptation to jump onto any bandwagon promoting any kind of alternative energy source stronger, but it is necessary to be careful.

Countries should invest in Research and Development until there is enough scientific evidence that would justify any appreciable investment in biofuels,because the evidence that biofuels both food crops and non-food crops are responsible for the current global food crisis is overwhelming.

The use of food crops like corn or soy for biofuels production impacts on the world, just as the cultivation of non-food crops like Jatropha which would be competing for arable land for food crops.

Woes of the Ghanaian freelance journalist

2009-06-07T10:01:00.000-07:00

Working as a freelance journalist in Ghana is not one of the options available to journalists in the country.

Indeed, there are very few options available for journalists; even though, there is growth and expansion in the media in Ghana, particularly, radio and TV, opportunities for professional journalists are few and wages are very low.

To survive as a freelance journalist, therefore, one has to be a rare breed of the stock, to even consider the idea. Indeed, fact is, the concept as it is known in Ghana is literally non-existent. It is a misnomer. And that explains why Ghanaian freelance journalists are not taken serious, not even by their own peers.

The plain truth is that you just can’t make any decent living working as a freelance in Ghana, unless you are very smart. I mean smart enough not to limit the scope of your writing and style. You must be smart enough to learn other writing skills like speech writing, technical writing, feature writing as well as acquire editing skills. You could even add graphic designing skills and may be look for some extra money and pay at some IT training institution to train in one web technology or the other.

Well, and don’t forget, you must add photography to it, because you are most likely to make much more money from photography than from just writing, and by this I mean commercial photography. Believe me, it is true. Or else, you are heading for a life of misery with no security for retirement.

I remember some 10 or so years ago, I met my good friend Haruna Atta, editor of the Accra Mail newspaper somewhere near the old Press Centre at Kokomlemle. As we chatted, he asked me which paper I worked with. This question is almost an anathema to most of the freelance journalists I know in Ghana. You may find out from Iddi Ali, one fellow I know who is so committed to the profession and the tenets it stands for.

But just wait and hear Haruna’s response to my answer to his question.

I told him I worked as a freelance journalist. He immediately let out a wry smile, looked me straight in the eyes and said, “well, you know in Ghana, when journalists lose their jobs, they become freelance journalists.”

I smiled back too, but I wasn’t sure if my smile had some wryness in it though. That is the truth as it is seen in Ghana. Unemployed journalists, claim to be freelance journalists!

You are a journalist, and you lose your job. So, you take on some tag of respectability by claiming to be a freelance. That’s the point, and it is not only a perception, but has been craftily contrived into a reality.

As a matter of fact Haruna is not the only journalist in this country who shares in this view. Nana Kofi Coomson, who was once described by Vincent Asisseh, himself a journalist, as the ‘enfant terrible’ of Ghanaian journalism holds the same view. He doesn’t believe any serious journalist could work as a freelance in Ghana working for the Ghanaian press and media.

Sad, isn’t it? The fact is you can’t be a freelance journalist in Ghana! And that is for one simple reason. The money is not worth it! You hardly get paid for your works and when you are lucky to get paid weeks or even months after your works have been published, you get very meager fees, not enough to even cover the cost of writing the story itself!

And of course, when you tell anyone you work as a freelance journalist, they suddenly think of Ben Ephson and Kwaku Sakyi-Addo, because these two and a few others including Ruby Ofori for a long time were BBC correspondents in Ghana, and they worked as freelance journalists.

Ghanaian newspapers, TV and radio stations just do not pay freelance journalists. Period! They do not factor freelance writers in their plans. Or, do they?

Even the national newspaper, the Daily Graphic which is presumably the highest paying newspaper in Ghana does not offer respectable fees. The Daily Graphic pays as little as GH¢10, for a full length article, and this article could cost as much as GH¢25 to GH¢30 or more to do. That includes the cost of research and the actual writing and filing of the story.

The privately-owned newspapers are worse off. They pay literally nothing for freelance work. No matter how good the work is. They would mostly want to publish freelance works for free and in most cases, when they find these works elsewhere, and they are mostly high quality writing, they simply copy, put their bylines to them and publish!

Thankfully, I was able to survive working as a freelance journalist in Ghana for over 10 years.

In these times I have experienced some exhilarating moments especially when I see my works in print or when what I have written gets national response and some major decisions are taken resulting in some benefits to ordinary Ghanaians. Some of my freelance works have also generated international responses, especially, my focus on e-waste in Ghana.

But there have been downsides too. I have had to travel to remote areas in Ghana to work, and never got paid anything worth my efforts.

The most heartbreaking periods of my carrier have been, always when I see my works plagiarized by others, including some very respectable individuals, newspapers, radio and TV stations in this country. But I endured the pains stoically.

One of my favorite writers and inspirers, the American Evangelical journalist and writer Tim Bascom, after working for several years in the media and rising to the position of editor of Interlit, a world class magazine for publishers, willingly resigned his position to go and work as a freelance writer.

But who is a freelance writer? And what is freelance writing? The dictionary says, a freelance, was once a knight whose services were purchasable by any state or command.

And this is how Victor Chen a freelance writer describes the word, he says, “today in journalism a freelance is one who writes for newspapers or magazines without being regularly employed, and despite the notions of independence bound up in the word, it might well stand for ‘free to starve.’”

Tim Bascom argues that technically, a freelance is a “lance” for hire, free to work on any subject, a sort of literally mercenary.

Fact is a freelance writer’s life is a tough one. They tackle assignments not everyone wants to do. They dare to be useful most of the time, even to the point of writing the mundane just so they can make a living.

For me, working as a freelance in Ghana was not an initial pleasant experience. It was like a little child who has been yanked from the safe arms of the mother by unexplained circumstances and thrown onto the streets to fend for himself. Of course, this child would not know what to do. And in most cases, I didn’t know what to do.

But I survived. I was toughened by the very circumstances of a freelance writer. I have had to vacillate between hope and despair, excitement and disappointments. Loneliness, uncertainty, and sometimes professional ostracism.

In a piece in 1998, Tim Bascom lamented the horrible lifestyle of a freelance, when he wrote, “I have 80 articles in print, plus two books and a dozen poems. But after years of trying to make a living as a freelance writer, I now admit I probably will never succeed.”

For Chen, a freelancer’s life is a chancy one. He or she never knows where the next pay check is coming from.

Given the opportunity, which Ghanaian journalist would like to work as a freelance for the media in Ghana? Well, probably that might become attractive one day when, media owners take freelance writers serious and pay them well.

For me, working as a freelance journalist opened new opportunities for growth and independent critical thinking, which have become more so valuable in the conduct of my everyday life.

I took a break from my freelance life after studies at the University of Ghana, Legon and worked with the online units of two radio stations in Accra briefly, but had to quit these jobs for good reasons. I have now decided to turn on fully, my entrepreneurial skills and have singlehandedly set up Ghana’s premier business news portal, www.ghanabusinessnews.com.

I guess probably, I would be making history as the first Ghanaian journalist to set up an online medium for news. I do some freelance work though, but mostly for the international media. I started www.ghanabusinessnews.com in December 2008, but the site has gained popularity so fast. It is possibly the fastest growing and most credible website in Ghana today.

For instance, the statistics for May 2009 show 56,006 visits, 269,683 pages viewed and 1,996, 139 hits.

Thankfully, the experiences and tenacity I have accumulated over the painful years of freelance journalism in Ghana is paying off, as I have learned to express independence, objectivity, and a high level of professionalism in my works.

Ghana's Jatropha conundrum - begging for more answers

2009-05-30T06:42:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Ghana is already making history as it leads in Africa’s Jatropha investment story

Indeed, Ghana is a remarkable country for making history in Africa south of the Sahara. The country often stands out for the best and worst in both what is imaginable and unimaginable. The country is the first south of the Sahara to attain independence and end colonial rule by the British.

Not long ago, the country made history again in Africa for conducting a free and fair election which it proudly followed up with a peaceful transfer of political power to a new government.

And too soon, the country is in the news again. Ghana is becoming the Jatropha centre in Africa south of the Sahara. The attraction which the country has as a welcoming place for investors interested in the wonder plant, Jatropha which hopefully, would be the world’s answer to alternative energy sources is resonating across the globe even in such difficult times when the entire globe is being buffeted by an economic crisis. Despite the economic crisis, the investors in Jatropha and other biofuel crops are trooping into Ghana pledging investments in tens of millions of dollars.

The attraction is such that a global conference claiming to assemble giants in the area of knowledge and expertise in cultivating Jatropha and turning it into biodiesel worth millions of dollars for export has been held in Ghana.

But as one digs deeper into the Jatropha story, one appears to be dogged by more questions than answers.

Ghana Jatropha report

In 2005, the government of Ghana set up a Biofuel Committee (BFC) with the objective to develop a National Biofuel Policy (NBP).

The BFC conducted a study and submitted the following recommendations:

The BFC recommended that National Biofuel Policy should accelerate the development of the biofuel industry in Ghana with special emphasis on the production of biodiesel from Jatropha.

It recommended that the country should substitute 20% of national gasoil consumption and 30% of national kerosene consumption with Jatropha oil by 2015; remove institutional barriers in order to promote private sector investments and management of the biodiesel industry.

Another recommendation was to create favourable regulatory climate to ensure development of; competitive market; favourable pricing regime and high quality product.

It also called for Research and Development to improve the efficiency of biodiesel production technologies, reduce production costs, to raise quality and efficacy of product and suggested that in the medium to long term, Ghana should become a net-exporter of biofuels.

It has been four years now and there is yet to be a clearly defined policy on the biofuel sector to give the industry some structure. And so it appears, as it stands now, it is a free-for-all situation.

Claims about Jatropha

Jatropha, obviously has a valuable use, as its seed contains oil that can be used for biodiesel to power machines and cars. But it appears we don’t have all the facts and as a result there are several claims being made about Jatropha’s economic value to the globe.

One biofuels company Gold Star Farms claims on its website that the company plants a “specific strain of Jatropha that takes one year before they bear fruit and two years before they are producing a full yield.”

One of the company’s executives, Mr. Jack Holden has said that it has commitments from farmers to grow the crop on approximately five million acres of land in Ghana.

The company, he added, plans to begin producing biodiesel at its facility in Nkawkaw, in the Eastern region of Ghana, in 2009.

He said these sometime last year after Gold Star Biofuels, a subsidiary of Ghana based Gold Star Farms Ltd, had formed a joint venture with Aiken, S.C.-based USFuelTech LLC, a provider of turnkey modular biodiesel production facilities, to design and build small biodiesel plants in Chile that will use locally cultivated Jatropha as a feedstock.

The claim that the company is planting a strain which produces yields in two years is doubtful as the experience in India has shown. In the India experiment 22 agribusiness colleges were involved, and their reports were unanimous – it takes about four to five years for Jatropha plants to yield.

And D1 Oils a British company, which was involved in a large scale Jatropha project in India believes that it will be at least an eight-year wait before varieties with good yields on wastelands are developed. Even D1’s E1 variety is not yet available in sufficient quantities, a report in the Naional, an Adu Dhabi publication has said. D1 Oils is one of the companies operating in Ghana.

The claim that Jatropha grows on marginal or wastelands is also questionable. It has been asserted by researchers in India that if planted on marginal land, the plant would only yield marginally. In other words, Jatropha would yield efficiently when planted on arable land, making it compete with land for food crops which is the contention of opponents of the Jatropha promoters.

Professor RR Shah of Navsari Agricultural University was quoted by the National as saying that “the literature said that with dry land, after four years’ growth, you can get a yield of 1kg per plant. For us, it is hardly 200g per plant.”

Someone who said he is an agronomist said in a comment on an earlier article on Jatropha on ghanabusinessnews.com that he had told proponents of large scale Jatropha on marginal land that every plant needs irrigation and fertile soil to grow well and produce high yields, and so is Jatropha. He further argues that the claim that Jatropha can give high yields on waste lands has not yet fully been investigated.

He further made an interesting observation; he said, “moreover, from an agriculture point of view, adding mineral fertilizers in a soil containing less organic matter induces a loss of fertility!”

The cost of cultivation

The cost of cultivating Jatropha from all indications is high. As one investor has said, the
cost of cultivating 10,000 hectares of Jatropha is US$14 million, and that excludes irrigation and does not include processing for the extraction of the oil.

And according to the UN, harvesting Jatropha requires one worker for every one acre of land.

The cost of fossil fuel as against biofuel

The cost of producing biofuels, would make much reason in as much as the cost of fossil fuels remain high. But when prices come down, it makes little economic sense to continue to invest in biofuels, even though, it is also being argued that biofuels are more useful to the environment, or is it not?

NGOs, such as FoodSPAN, Action Aid and lately Friends of the Earth have been making calls for rationalization of the biofuels sector in Ghana and other African countries. But these NGOs have been accused of raising false alarm. It is being argued that NGOs need donor money to survive and the only way they get sponsorship for their activities is to make noise about a situation and make it look bad, even though, the case might not be so.

FoodSPAN and Action Aid are claiming that arable land is being taken away from poor farmers in the northern part of Ghana for the cultivation of Jatropha for the production of biofuels. These activities they claim is further pushing these poor farmers into deeper poverty and hunger and leading to further deforestation which also has consequences for the environment.

But the biofuels companies, mostly multinationals from wealthy nations claim otherwise.

Their alibi is that they are providing jobs for local farmers and building local communities with their investments. They insist their activities are not in anyway harmful to local farming activities, but rather a blessing.

But as events stand now, Ghana certainly is in a Jatropha conundrum, which only more clearer, convincing answers can resolve.

Source: ghanabusinessnews.com

What lessons for Ghana in India's jatropha failure?

2009-05-23T22:37:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Would a jatropha crisis hit the world just as the current global economic crisis hit most nations unprepared?

Some analysts are arguing that, the level of the impact of the crisis is so because early warning signals were ignored, and lessons in economic failures of the past were never learned.

Is the investor community learning all they could about the jatropha or biofuel business?

Ghana has become the jatropha centre in Africa south of the Sahara.

There is literally a scramble for land in Ghana by multinationals and local companies in partnership with foreigners vigorously pursuing plans in cultivation of the jatropha plant for its prized oil seed to produce biodiesel for export.

Over twenty companies from various countries are in Ghana acquiring land to cultivate non-food crops and other crops for the production of ethanol and biodiesel, mostly for export.

These companies come from Brazil, Italy, Norway, Israel, China, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium and India.

They are cultivating fields in the Volta, Brong Ahafo, Ashanti, Eastern and the Northern regions of Ghana. The main non-food crop that these companies are planting is jatropha.

One of the companies, Agroils of Italy is cultivating 10,000 hectares of jatropha in Yeji in the Brong Ahafo region.

Israeli company, Galten has acquired 100,000 hectares of land and an Indian company is requesting for 50,000 hectares of land from the Ghana Investment Promotion Council (GIPC), to cultivate jatropha.

A company from the Netherlands has started a pilot project on 10 acres in the northern region and the Chinese are also doing a pilot project.

Gold Star Farms Ltd., is cultivating five million acres of land to plant jatropha for the production of biofuels for export.

A Norwegian company ScanFuel Ltd., has started operations outside Kumasi in the Ashanti region to produce biofuel. The company aims to start initial cultivation of jatropha seeds on 10,000 hectares of land.

The company which has a Ghanaian subsidiary, ScanFuel Ghana Ltd., says its Ghanaian unit has contracted about 400,000 hectares of land, with up to 60 percent reserved for biofuel production, “not less” than 30 percent for food production and the remainder for biodiversity buffer zones.

Another Norwegian company, Biofuels Africa Ltd., the only one among the about 20 biofuels companies cultivating jatropha to receive an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) permit from Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) which covers 23,762.45 hectares of its project area is operating in two locations.

Even though, Ghana has no policy, regulations nor structures in place for the biofuels industry, cultivating any company cultivating anything more than 10 hectares is required to conduct an EIA for approval by the EPA.

All together, these companies are cultivating the jatropha plant on millions of hectares of land with the hope of producing biofuels for export.

The cost involved in cultivating 10,000 hectares of jatropha, one investor has said is approximately US$14 million – and that is when it is not irrigated. And this raises some questions about the commitment of some of these companies to follow through with their projects successfully.

The cost of an extraction plant if bought from India costs about US$3 million but could cost about US$9 million when bought from the West and an additional US$2 million would be required for storage and logistics.

As these companies pursue their dreams, it would be worthwhile to consider India’s failure in attempting to produce biodiesel from jatropha and learn some lessons.

The jatropha tree takes four to five years to mature fully. According to Satish Lele of the Indian Biofuels Awareness Centre, during the cultivation period if the plantation is rain fed, these plants can yield 0.35 to 0.375 gallon of oil per tree or 375 gallons per hectare or 150 gallons per acre. If it is irrigated (3 to 5 liters per plant every 15 days) it can be double this amount.

Planting jatropha alone is not economically attractive, he argues further, as there is little income from it for the first two to three years. The jatropha plant is initially small in height, and he, therefore, suggests that, castor should be intercropped with it in fallow land, to get income and oil.

The Indian experience

The National, a newspaper published in Abu Dhabi in its May 11, 2009 issue, published an article titled; ‘Jatropha seeds yield little hope for India’s oil dream.’

The article referred to a project that was embarked upon by Professor R. R. Shah in 2005, when he sent a team to Navsari Agricultural University’s most parched and desolate strip of land, a farm in the Vyasa district of India’s northern state of Gujarat.

The team was instructed to set up a model farm for jatropha, the hardy shrub with oil-rich seeds that were then emerging as one of the most promising alternatives to crude oil. At the time, jatropha’s promise seemed boundless. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam, the president of the University, even used his presidential address that year to extol the virtues of jatropha.

“Jatropha can survive in the most arid wastelands”, the story went. And so vast barren swathes of India could be put to productive use. It is inedible so it would not cause a backlash by competing with food crops, it said.

The government, according to the publication announced a scheme to plant 13 million hectares, enough to generate nearly 500,000 barrels of jatropha oil per day.

But as Prof Shah’s project in Vyasa nears its end this month, the dean of agribusiness at Navsari is sceptical. “There is no yield,” he says. “The literature said that with dry land, after four years’ growth, you can get a yield of 1kg per plant. For us, it is hardly 200g per plant.”

The consensus of the team of experts after evaluating India’s jatropa projects from 22 agribusiness colleges across the country was that, indeed, jatropha would grow on wasteland, but would give no appreciable yield.

“This is not a wasteland crop. It needs fertiliser, water and good management. Yes, it grows on wasteland, but it doesn’t give you any yield,” the publication quotes Dr Suman Jha a researcher on Prof. Shah’s team as saying.

If this observation is anything to go by, then the persistent argument that jatropha could grow on unproductive agriculture land should be looked at again. This argument also challenges the assertion that investors are not a threat to smallholder farmers,whose productive agriculture land stands to be annexed by powerful multinationals for the cultivation of biofuel crops.

Non of the projects cited in The National story, including D1 Oils’, a London-listed biofuels company, which has planted about 257,000 hectares of jatropha, mainly in India was successful. The company moved far too early.

The report indicated that D1 is also having some nasty surprises on yield. It said in 2006 that it aimed to produce 2.7 tonnes of oil per hectare from areas planted with its new E1 variety, and 1.7 tonnes of oil from normal seed. That is equivalent to about 8 tonnes and 5 tonnes of seed per hectare respectively, or 3.5kg and 2kg a plant.

According to the report, Pradip Bhar, who runs the company’s D1 Williamson Magor Bio Fuel joint venture in India’s north east, admits he has yet to achieve a fraction of that.

Those are the results from the fertile state of Assam, According to the report. The yields in other, dryer states such as Jharkand and Orissa, he says, are much worse.

Mr Bhar intends to hold the area under cultivation steady at about 132,000 hectares this year. As his plantations account for more than half of D1 Oils’ Jatropha crop, the company’s goal of planting 1 million hectares by 2011 looks like a tough one. He is concentrating instead on ensuring his small contract farmers continue tending it for the two or three years needed before it becomes profitable.

This challenge is one of the reasons why Prof Shah doubts the 500,000 hectares of jatropha the Indian government estimates has been planted so far. Only last month, he unsettled an annual meeting of the universities researching jatropha and India’s National Oilseeds and Vegetable Oil Development Board by reporting that only 5,000 hectares was actually under plantation in Gujarat, half the official estimate, the report added.

The Indian experience can provide sufficient evidence for a careful, and thorough, cost-benefit analysis of Ghana’s jatropha dream, before the bubble most probably bursts.

From May 27 to 28, an international conference on jatropha in Ghana would be considering the benefits of the crop to the global economy.

Hopefully, the conference would not hype the benefits of jatropha and neglect the possible pitfalls. An objective consideration of all the possibilities, including that of possible failure, as the Indian experience has shown so as to minimize any collateral damage in the long term is necessary for the move forward.

The companies investing in jatropha and other non-food crops for the production of biofuels including the ones from India, have lots of lessons to learn from India’s example, so as not to repeat the mistake.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Africa not attractive investment centre for American businesses - Report

2009-05-21T10:16:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

American businesses are not investing in Africa as they should due to a number of reasons including corruption, lawlessness unstable governments and inadequate infrastructure.

They are also hesitant to put their money in African countries because of the apparent lack of political will by African governments to curb corruption, a report released Wednesday May 20, 2009 by Baird’s CMC, a communications marketing consultancy together with the US Chamber of Commerce.

The report a copy of which was made available to ghanabusinessnews.com indicates that, overall, US businesses do not view Africa as an attractive place to invest.

The businesses take into consideration, the image of lawlessness, corruption, unstable governments, an inadequate infrastructure, uneducated or untrained people, and an unwelcoming government attitude toward business.

The businesses believe that these practices handicap those who will not or cannot “play the game” by these rules.

In addition, returns are not reasonably ensured or sustainable because costs can often escalate for reasons unrelated to business operations and the rules can change unexpectedly. This means that the time and resources already invested could be lost, the report said.

The report which is titled ‘The conversation behind closed doors: Inside the Boardroom: How Coporate America Really views Africa’ is in two parts, the study for the second part is ongoing.

The US Chamber of Commerce which is the world’s largest business federation has a membership of more than three million businesses and organizations of every size, sector and region as well as 112 affiliates in 99 countries around the world.

One of the objectives of the qualitative survey was to examine why US companies hesitate to invest in Africa. It also looked at what American businesses and African countries can do to increase US investments across the continent.

Ten industries were looked at in the survey and these are,aerospace/defense, agribusiness, consumer goods, health care and information and communications technology.

The others are, infrastructure, media, petrochemical/extractive, pharmaceutical and transportation.

The Executives who were interviewed, the report indicated, do not yet believe that they are at a competitive disadvantage because they are not investing in African countries.

According to the report, with no competitive traction, there is no sense of an opportunity being missed. Furthermore, since Africa is not selling itself overtly by asking for investment, the continent does not attract enough attention amidst competition for investment from other developing countries or regions. The only exceptions to this are China and India.

While the report recognized the fact that African countries are marketing themselves and creating the environment to attract investments, the lack of the following is a disincentive:

The fact that the rule of law does not prevail to the degree required to make Africa an attractive investment destination. This applies to corporate, societal, and criminal law.

Africa, the businesses observed, does not offer a sufficiently large middle class of consumers or show consistent economic growth that could promise a future market. Most African countries are small and have poor markets, and there are barriers to regional markets—such as taxes and the freedom of movement of people and goods.

According to the report however, if African countries want to position themselves, to attract a lot more foreign direct investment (FDI), from America, then they should do several things including the following:

• Invest in the health and education of the African people to create a large pool of skilled and productive human resources.

• Invest in and maintain infrastructure—transportation, communications, electricity, and security—so that there will be a reliable society in which to operate.

• Build a functioning legal system to ensure the rule of law, transparency, and fair play.

• Create a positive climate for foreign investments by reducing bureaucratic processes, eliminating corruption, and reforming tax systems, irrespective of country of origin.

• Ensure stable political environments—that may or may not be based on western democratic principles—that work toward the common good of all stakeholders in society.

How ghanabusinessnews.com saved eTranzact, US man from cyber crimes

2009-05-18T04:00:00.000-07:00

The increasing spate of cyber crimes emanating from Ghana have become a canker that is leaving in its trail victims – both big and small. But through the high standards of journalism that focuses on the real issues that ghanabusinessnews.com is pursuing, we have recently saved eTranzact an electronic money transfer company in Ghana and an American citizen, Ralph Buglione from criminals using the internet to steal money from them.

eTranzact was launched only March 27, 2009 and barely a month after that some cyber criminals had cloned the company’s server and created an email address through which they sent emails to as many people as possible, including even those who are not customers of eTranzact asking them to verify their accounts. The criminals would then access customers’ accounts details and siphone money from their accounts.

When ghanabusinessnews.com got hold of a copy of the email, we immediately called an official of e-Tranzact to alert him and to get his comments. That call and the story that followed, pushed the company to spring into action – eTranzact immediately sent text messages to its customers to disclaim the email.

This saved e-Tranzact’s participating banks and customers from further bigger loses, as a source said the criminals made some successes before the message got to customers.

According to the source some customers’ accounts were broken into and monies siphoned from them. The source told ghanabusinessnews.com that about five banks in Ghana were hit by the criminals. The source would however not reveal the banks choosing to respect the banks’ right not to disclose thefts that occur in them, in order to maintain their credibility in the public eye.

The source said millions of cedis were involved, but for ghanabusinessnews.com’s quick act, it could have been worse.

Last Friday, 55-year-old Florida, US resident Ralph Buglione specifically wrote to us to clarify some issues regarding a message he received from one Anita Brown, who claims to be a Jamaican citizen in Accra, Ghana.

According to Buglione, he met this lady through a dating site called Tagged.com. The lady asked to chat with him on Yahoo Messenger and he obliged. Following the development in their conversations he wrote to us:

I am a Florida USA resident who this week was talking with a young lady named Anita Brown in Accra Ghana both by Yahoo Messenger text & video.

I see where you wrote an article on the subject of Internet service in Ghana. The young lady (and I suspect it was actually a number of people who were sharing the keyboard when the video wasn’t on) wanted US $100 claiming her Internet service was about to be turned off. I just read another article about Internet service in Ghana costing the typical user about $35.

Can you tell me if you think this was a scam? I did a Google search of Ghana & scams and found out that gangs of individuals in Accra play these games with foreigners stealing money from them through promised matchmaking schemes I don’t think girl was geniunely interested in me unless you prove me wrong by telling me that $200 monthly for Internet costs in apartment in Ghana are not unusual.

I ended the conversation when she asked for the money.

The article which was on the cost of the internet in Ghana obviously saved him from this possible scam and he wrote to thank us.

There is no doubt that ghanabusinessnews.com has become the news portal of choice for many around the globe for the fact that we engage in good and high quality journalism.

We do so, because, we are motivated by the principles of good professional journalism that serves the public good by informing and educating individuals with relevant and useful news and information. You can always count on us.

Tullow Oil, Ghana EPA in permit tango - Who is saying the truth?

2009-05-14T02:13:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Tullow Oil, the British oil and gas exploration company operating in Ghana has responded to accusations by Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), that it presented inaccurate Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) reports to the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank to acquire a loan of $115 million.

The EPA on April 7, 2009 accused Tullow Oil and its partner, Texas based Kosmos Energy of presenting inaccurate EIA reports to the IFC to secure loans to the tune of $215 million to finance their activities in Ghana.

According to the EPA the two companies are at the second stage of completing comprehensive EIA reports.

On a Joy News bulletin monitored by ghanabusinessnews.com Tuesday April 7, 2009, Mr. Ebenezer Acquah Sampong, who is Head of Environmental Assessment at the EPA said the two companies would be compelled to complete the EIA before they are allowed to start operations.

He said the Environmental Assessment Regulation of 1999 requires that before any company embarks on any project of that nature, it goes through the full EIA procedure and is given a permit.

He said the procedure requires that companies register, and then they do a scoping exercise and submit a scoping report with a terms of reference for the study. He said however, before a ‘scoping report’ is submitted “extensive consultations ought to be done with all major stakeholders to know their concerns about the project.”

He said the companies have done that and submitted a report, but they were told to go back and do wider consultations at all levels at the national, regional, and district levels.

Seeking to clarify this matter, ghanabusinessnews.com wrote to Tullow Oil and Kosmos Energy to get their side of the story, and after over a month, it is only Tullow Oil that has responded to our request, Kosmos Energy has not even acknowledged receipt of our email.

In an email response to ghanabusinessnews.com, signed by Tony Djokoto, Senior Legal Counsel for Tullow Ghana Limited, Tullow Oil said, “regarding the EPA accusations, as you know, we have a valid permit from the EPA that governs our current activities and regard ourselves as being compliant with the terms of the permit. We are still in discussions with the relevant Governmental stakeholders and will revert to you once we have an outcome.”

But the EPA says, “as far as we are concerned, no Environmental Impact Assessment report has been submitted to us and they know that and we have made our position known to them.”

Mr. Sampong said, emphatically that the only report the EPA has received from the oil companies is a scoping report.

Meanwhile, civil society orgnisations are also insisting that Tullow Oil and Kosmos Energy have not done comprehensive environmental impact assessments on the projects.

Ghana discovered oil in commercial quantities in 2007 leading to high hopes of economic boom for the country. Concerns were immediately raised by various interest groups about the dangers inherent in the discovery of oil to the country’s social and economic health.

Nigeria and some other African countries who have oil were cited as examples and calls were made for Ghana to get it right from the word go so that the country can avoid the canker associated with oil-rich African countries.

There have been perpetual violent conflicts particularly in the Niger Delta of Nigeria, where the bulk of the country’s oil is drilled.

With these developments, it is hard to tell, if Ghana is not already missing the point before commercial production begins in 2010.

Ghanaian man poses as Iraq soldier, defrauds US woman of $10,000

2009-05-13T14:32:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

A Ghanaian man posing as a US soldier in Iraq has defrauded an American woman of $10,000 by false pretences, the Gateway News has reported.

The publication quoting an April 20, 2009 police report, said the woman a resident of Streetsboro in Ohio gave the money to the scammer believing she was helping a US soldier in Iraq.

According to the report the woman, who was not named, began an online relationship with the man in January. The man claimed he is in the army stationed in Iraq.

The woman told police that in the next four months, after they met, she gave the man $10,000.

The woman, according to the report told police that the man told her that he had been discharged from the army and was trying to leave Iraq with a “large sum” of money.

The man, she said, kept reporting “problems along the way” as he tried to return to America and needed more money from her.

According to the police report, the man requested that the money was to be sent to his “associate” in Ghana.

After she gave him the $10,000 he kept asking her for more money, but the woman said she could not afford to send him any more money.

Soon after that, the man started calling her saying “his life was in danger” and he needed more money, according to the police report. At this point, co-workers advised her to go to the police, and that was when she made a report to the police.

Meanwhile, a U.S. Army agent, who helped police with the investigation told police that he had found that a soldier with the same picture given to the woman had been in Iraq.

The report indicated that Police contacted the soldier, who said the photos were from a social networking Web site, but he had never visited the Web site the woman said she met the man on.

However, the soldier said he had been contacted by a different woman asking him “personal questions”, but thought it was a scam and did not reply to her. The solider said in the report that the woman may have been lured into a similar fraud using his likeness.

The incident was filed with the Internet Crime Complaint Center for further investigation, the report stated.

Internet scams known in Ghana as ‘sakawa’ have reached what authorities call “alarming proportions”. About 82 cyber crimes are said to occur in Ghana every month, and Ghana and Nigeria have been blacklisted by some retail shops in the US and Canada.

Today, May 13, 2009, the Daily Graphic carried a story about the Ghana Education Service calling for an “emergency national response” to salvage the future of hundreds of school children who are increasingly being lured into the phenomenon of ‘sakawa’. The report indicated that internet fraud has gained notoriety in the country lately.

According to the report, it is not clear when ’sakawa’ began in Ghana but the cyber fraud, which is akin to the notorious Nigerian ‘419′ scam, is believed to have taken deep roots in Agona Swedru in the Central region, from where, like an epidemic, it spread to other parts of the country in no time.

Enquiries made indicate that mainly in the ghettos of some of the major towns in the country such as Kumasi, Koforidua, Sunyani and Accra, ’sakawa’ is becoming a major cause of pupil truancy involving many schoolchildren aged between 12 and 18 as they abandon the classrooms for Internet cafes, it said.

The Daily Graphic also indicated that cyber crime is linked to occultism and the modus operandi of those who engage in it includes the use of their victims’ credit cards to purchase items including expensive vehicles and household items on the Internet which are subsequently shipped to Ghana.

Sometimes the operators pose as females, manage to secure relationships on the Internet with male foreigners and subsequently discuss the possibility of marriage with them. But after convincing their victims to send them money for visa and other travelling documents to join them abroad, they hit a jackpot and abscond.

Why Ghana is popular for investments in biofuels

2009-05-11T05:54:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Ghana has become a major centre of attraction for the cultivation of biofuels in Africa for a number of reasons, even though some of these reasons are hard to tell.

Currently, the country features prominently on the radar of alternative energy interests, especially in the cultivation of the non-food plant jatropha for the production of biofuels.

Ghana, Thailand and Uruguay have been identified by a study conducted by the University of Wisconsin-Madison Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies in 2007, as becoming the leading producer countries of the emerging renewable fuel known as biodiesel.

One of the factors that put Ghana among the leading league of nations with a high potential for biodiesel production is the fact that large volumes of the product can be produced at low cost.

Overall, the study ranked Malaysia, Thailand, Colombia, Uruguay and Ghana as the developing nations most likely to attract biodiesel investment, not only because of their strong agricultural industries, but also due to their relative safety and stability, lack of debt, among other economic factors.

Ghana is ranked high in Africa as a politically stable country, with a growing culture of democracy. Labour is also believed to be cheaper in Ghana than in most African countries, even though some investors disagree on that score.

One investor in the biofuels sector in Ghana argues that the cost of labour in Ghana is not cheap after all, because in his view, “the Ghanaian worker is not efficient as compared to the Chinese worker.”

While an employer might be paying a Ghanaian worker what is estimated to be low wages, the Ghanaian worker is proverbially known “to pretend to be working, while the employer pretends to be paying him.”

Indeed, this is not only a notion but a fact, because most employers in Ghana pay very low wages, irrespective of qualifications, experience or job description. Most Ghanaian workers are therefore, not motivated to give off their best. Substandard work performance has become a norm in Ghana.

Ironically, however, this belief that wages are low in Ghana also makes the country a choice destination for industries, especially the biofuels businesses.

There are companies from Brazil, Italy, Norway, Israel, China, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium and India investing in the area in Ghana.

They are cultivating fields in the Volta, Brong Ahafo, Ashanti, Eastern and the Northern regions of Ghana. The main non-food crop that these companies are planting is jatropha.

Jatropha has oil-rich seeds that can be used to produce biodiesel.

While its supporters argue that it can be grown on semi-arid land and so poses less of a threat to food output than other biofuel feedstocks such as grains and vegetable oils, its opponents argue that investors are taking away productive agriculture land from poor local farmers for the purpose.

Currently, there is an ongoing debate, accusations and counter-accusations of land grabbing between NGOs, Action Aid and FoodSPAN on one hand and Rural Consult, a consultancy firm on biofuels on the other.

One of the companies, Agroils of Italy is currently cultivating jatropha on 10,000 hectares of land in Yeji in the Brong Ahafo region of Ghana for biofuels.

Israeli company, Galten has acquired 100,000 hectares of land and an Indian company is requesting for 50,000 hectares of land from the Ghana Investment Promotion Council (GIPC), to cultivate jatropha.

A company from the Netherlands has started a pilot project on 10 acres in the northern region and the Chinese are also doing a pilot project.

Gold Star Farms Ltd., is cultivating five million acres of land to plant jatropha for the production of biofuels for export.

A Norwegian company ScanFuel Ltd., has started operations outside Kumasi in the Ashanti region to produce biofuel. The company aims to start initial cultivation of jatropha seeds on 10,000 hectares of land.

The company which has a Ghanaian subsidiary, ScanFuel Ghana Ltd., says its Ghanaian unit has contracted about 400,000 hectares of land, with up to 60 percent reserved for biofuel production, “not less” than 30 percent for food production and the remainder for biodiversity buffer zones.

Another Norwegian company, Biofuels Africa Ltd., the only one among the about 20 biofuels companies cultivating jatropha to receive an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) permit from Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) which covers 23,762.45 hectares of its project area is operating in two locations.

Steinar Kolnes, CEO, Co-founder and director of BioFuel Africa Limited has told ghanabusinessnews.com by email that the company is currently operating in two locations in Ghana. The company has a 300 hectare test farm in Sogakope in the Volta region and a 10,696.32 hectares in Yendi in the Northern region.

According to him, the company has planted a total of 660 hectares of jatropha on its projects.

One of the complexities that might confront the growing biofuels industry in Ghana is the challenge of land acquisitions. There is a plurality of land tenure and management prevailing in Ghana.

There is the state/public system and the customary system. These systems have been poorly articulated over the years leading to increasing conflicts associated with land.

Public lands in Ghana fall into two main categories: land which has been compulsorily for a public purpose or in the public interest under the state lands Act 1962 (Act 125) or other relevant statute; and land which has been vested in the President, in trust for a landholding community under the Administration of Stool Lands Act, 1962 (Act 123.)

While government is working to streamline the land tenure system in the country, there are some advocating for a land bank system to make land acquisition smoother and beneficial to all.

Ghana is certainly attractive for investments, especially in the biofuels sector.

But the question some observers of the biofuel sector are asking is why is the country so enthusiastic about biofuels when it has found oil in commercial quantities?

Others are also asking why an agriculture country where only 16 per cent of arable land is used for food production would not rather concentrate on developing the food crop sector, but is diverting resources and labour in agric for the cultivation of non-food crops for biofuels.

Italian company plants jatropha on 10,000 hectares of land in Ghana for biofuel

2009-05-08T07:25:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

An Italian bioenergy consultancy company, Agroils is cultivating 10,000 hectares of jatropha in Ghana for the production of biofuels.

According to a report by Reuters, sited by ghanabusinessnews.com, Agroils is also investing in the cultivation of jatropha in three other African countries - Morocco, Senegal and Cameroon, and Latin American country Brazil.

Agroils’ Business Development Manager, Giovanni Venturini Del Greco, who is also a co-founder was quoted in the report as saying at an energy conference Thursday May 7, 2009 that the company aims at producing 100,000 tonnes of biofuel from the jatropha plant in 2018 in these countries where it works with local farmers.

The company started the cultivation in 2008, the report said.

He said, “our goal is a 100,000 tonne output in 2018.”

He told the conference that the projects include a 200-hectare field in a desert in Morocco and 10,000 hectares in Ghana. He said if the projects were successful the crop would grow in these areas.

Agroils is one of the about 20 companies cultivating jatropha and other crops to produce biofuels in Ghana. There are companies from Brazil, Norway, Israel, China, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium and India investing in the area in Ghana.

Jatropha has oil-rich seeds that can be used to produce biodiesel. While its supporters argue it can be grown on semi-arid land and so poses less of a threat to food output than other biofuel feedstocks such as grains and vegetable oils, its opponents argue that investors are taking away productive agriculture land from poor local farmers for the purpose.

As the debate rages on between investors and civil society organizations that see the growing number of investors as a threat to poor farmers, particularly in Ghana, the country has no policy on the cultivation of crops for biofuels – leaving the field further open for more intense debates.

The need for investments in alternative energy sources and growing more food are realities confronting the world, especially in the face of the current energy and food crises, coupled with the global economic downturn. But the debate would continue as regards best practices and lawful acquisitions of and use of land for biofuel crops as against food crops.

700,000 children to die in Africa as a result of global economic crisis!

2009-04-25T08:39:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The yet to be realized consequences of the global economic crisis holds a bleak future for Africa’s children, the World Bank has said.

The continent would be worst hit, even though, it was the least affected at the beginning of the crisis.

700,000 babies would die before they reach the age of one, as a result of the global economic crisis, according to the World Bank’s Vice President for Africa.

“This is a serious human and development disaster that is waiting to happen,” she said.

Ms. Obiageli Ezekwesili told Journalists on the continent during a video conference from the Bank’s Washington office on Wednesday April 22, 2009, that the impacts of the global crisis on the continent would be enormous.

She said 25 of the world’s 35 countries categorized as fragile by the World Bank are in Africa.

She also warned that unless effective responses and measures are taken most African countries would not be able to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by the year 2015.

Ghana and Tanzania were on course to achieve the number one objectives of the MDGs, which is half poverty by 2015 but due to the crisis, these countries are not likely to achieve the goal.

Some of the likely impacts of the crisis on the continent include a drop in foreign aid, foreign direct investments and remittances. Some foreign investors are holding their investments, foreign aid is not likely to increase because most countries are looking within to help their people first and most Africans who used to remit their families on the continent are out of job.

Ms. Ezekwesili reiterated the point that investments in Africa should go into infrastructure development so as to open up the continent’s economy to create jobs.

She also urged investments in agriculture which has the potential to increase employment.

Even before the economic crisis, Africa, despite the progress it was making still had a lot more to do to develop its human capital and economy.

Lack of transparency, accountability and inconsistencies in economic policies coupled with poor political leadership have been the bane of the continent.

Saddled with these counter-development trends, it does not appear the continent would be able to weather the storm when the full impact of the crisis hits.

Sadly, it is the poor and vulnerable who would bear the brunt of the effects, while the elite would continue to loot national coffers to cushion themselves and their cronies.

E-waste in Ghana – Anti-dumping legislation soon

2009-04-14T12:47:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Ghana’s Communications Minister has given hints of the possibility of government enacting legislation to stop the dumping of e-waste into Ghana, in a telephone interview with ghanabusinessnews.com Tuesday April 14, 2009.

Mr. Haruna Iddrisu said, “we have taken a serious view of the situation and we are considering the passing of anti-dumping legislation, particularly of used computers.”

According to the minister, most of the computers that arrive in the country have no use. He however, said he has no idea of the amount of e-waste that comes into the country’s waste stream.

Mr. Haruna Iddrisu, also told ghanabusinessnews.com that the Communications Ministry is in discussions with the Ministry of Finance “to impose prohibitive tariffs on the importation of used computers into the country.”

The fact that Ghana is a major dumping ground for e-waste from the US, Europe and other countries is undisputed, as evidence at the Agbogbloshie scrap yard and the number of used computer shops around the country have shown. The contents of some containers arriving at the Tema harbour have also revealed increasing amounts of e-waste entering the country, but steps towards stemming the ominous tide are slow.

Since April 2008, when the country’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the formation of a committee to deal with the situation nothing concrete has happened.

Much of what has happened, have been paper work and tough talk by public officials who appear not to be fully aware of the specific extent of the dumping and its measured effects on the country’s environment and human health.

Indeed, much of what has been done in concrete terms in direct relations to the dumping of e-waste into Ghana, have been done by foreign countries.

The European media also, unlike the Ghanaian media has given the situation serious coverage and broadcast.

For instance, the British government is investigating alleged dumping of e-waste into Ghana following media reports and pressure from international and British NGOs and some of its citizens. In February 2009, a 46-year-old South Sussex man was arrested on suspicion of exporting e-waste, the destination country was however, not mentioned. He is due to appear in court in May 2009.

Following that a container full of broken electronics equipment destined to Ghana was arrested at the port of Amsterdam, and a few days later eight men were arrested in connection with dumping e-waste in Ghana. Five of the men arrested are Ghanaians and the other three are citizens of Turkey - these men are currently due for trial.

Moreover, in Ghana one cannot find specific data on how much of the developed world’s e-waste comes into the country, because records are simply not kept.

But available data shows that as much as 75% of the 8.7 million tons of e-waste generated in the European Union cannot be accounted for, despite stringent regulations for recycling e-waste. In the US the figure is said to be about 80% or more because the amount of e-waste which is reported for recovery includes some of the e-waste exported to developing countries, according to Greenpeace, the international environmental group.

Ghana’s case requires urgent attention, because should the side effects of the cocktail of toxic chemicals in e-waste hit the country, it would be disastrous, considering the fact that the country has no capacity either scientifically or medically to deal with the problem.

Ghana is a signatory to the Basel Convention, the international convention on the control of transboundary movements of hazardous wastes and their disposal. The EU also has the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) regulation to which its member countries subscribe. The WEEE directive stipulates that Information Technology (IT) manufacturers are legally responsible for the safe disposal of their products, and are obliged to ensure all products are disposed of in an environmentally friendly manner themselves or sign up with a government-approved waste-handling firm to do it on their behalf. And under this regulation, recycling companies receive some public funding to collect and properly dispose of e-waste safely.

But it appears some individuals have found loopholes in the system and are exploiting it by conniving with some organisations to collect broken electronics and electrical items for onward shipment to Ghana and other developing countries under the guise of aid. Some even sell these out as secondhand items. The broken items end up being sold to scrap dealers who dismantle and sell the parts, after burning the cables to extract the copper.

What is e-waste?

E-waste is the generic name for electronics wastes. These are discarded electronics devices or broken electronics or electrical items that come into the waste stream from several sources. They include gadgets like televisions, personal computers (PCs), telephones, air conditioners, cell phones, and electronic toys.

The list can further be widened to include appliances such as lifts, refrigerators, washing machines, dryers, kitchen equipment or even air crafts.

Dangerous Chemicals

Electronics equipment is one of the largest known sources of heavy metals, toxic materials and organic pollutants in city waste.

E-waste is known to contain dangerous chemical pollutants that are released into the atmosphere and underground water.

The modes of disposal, which include dumping old gadgets into landfills or burning in smelters, also expose the environment and humans to a cocktail of toxic chemicals and poison. These chemicals contain substances like lead, mercury and arsenic.

The cathode ray tubes (CRTs) in most computer monitors and television screens have x-ray shields that contain 4 to 8 pounds of lead, mostly embedded in glass.

Flat screen monitors that are mostly used in laptops do not contain high concentrations of lead, but most are illuminated with fluorescent lights that contain some mercury.

A PC’s central processing unit (CPU), the module containing the chip and the hard disk, typically contains toxic heavy metals such as mercury (in switches), lead (in solder on circuit boards), and cadmium (in batteries).

Plastics used to house computer equipment and cover wire cables to prevent flammability often contain polybrominated flame retardants, a class of dangerous chemicals. Studies have shown that ingesting these substances may increase the risk of cancer, liver damage, and immune system dysfunction.

Lead, mercury, cadmium, and polybrominated flame retardants are all persistent, bio-accumulative toxins (PBTs), that can create environmental and health risks when computers are manufactured, incinerated, landfilled or melted during recycling. PBTs, in particular are a dangerous class of chemicals that linger in the environment and accumulate in living tissues.

And because they increase in concentration as they move up the food chain, PBTs can reach dangerous levels in living organisms, even when released in minute quantities. PBTs are harmful to human health and the environment and have been associated with cancer, nerve damage and reproductive disorders.

Looked at individually, the chemicals contained in e-waste are a cocktail of dangerous pollutants that kill both the environment and humans slowly.

Invest in agriculture to overcome food shortages in Africa – Kofi Annan

2009-03-18T15:10:00.000-07:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Africa can overcome its food shortages if agriculture is taken seriously and investments made into the sector, Mr. Kofi Annan has said.

The immediate past General-Secretary of the United Nations, was speaking at the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Standard Bank and Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), in Accra Wednesday March 18, 2009.

He said, “there is no doubt that if Africa were to overcome its food shortages, that we would need to take agriculture very seriously and invest substantially in agricultural development.”

The ceremony which took place at the La Palm Royal Beach Hotel, saw the signing of a partnership agreement between AGRA and Standard Bank for a US$100 million low interest loan to help assist African farmers.

Mr. Annan noted that, the agreement to help assist Africa’s small scale farmers out of poverty, signals a new way of doing business.

He indicated that until now African smallholder farmers have been struggling on their own. He said, “it is only the African farmer who swam or drowned alone without any financial assistance, no insurance and no government assistance.”

Mr. Annan also stated the fact that it is the women who mostly work to feed the population in Africa.
He was hopeful that an insurance programme would be introduced to help African farmers.

Mr. Annan said “the signing of this agreement today shows that we recognize that the global food and financial crisis is continuing to have impact on Africa’s most vulnerable - inflation, food shortages, trade imbalances, and the tightening of global credit which pose huge social, economic and political risk for this continent.”

He was optimistic that Africa can and should become self-sufficient in food production. Admitting the fact that governments cannot do it alone, he said governments and partners in the public and private sector should come together to bring the transformation that is required to develop agriculture.

Mr. Annan believes that the action initiated by Africans will bring transformation to many lives and put food on the tables of millions in Africa.

The Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) also declared its intention to participate in the partnership. Its Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Benjamin Esson Benjamin made a contribution of US$2 million to the programme.

The Chief Executive of Standard Bank, Jacko Maree said, the goal of the bank was to perform a transformational role in the continent’s agriculture in partnership with other organizations.

In addition to the US$100 million made available for lending over three years by Standard Bank, AGRA and other partners are providing US$10 million loan guarantee fund.

The fund would operate initially in Ghana, Mozambique, Tanzania and Uganda. Each country would receive US$25 million.

Lending to Africa’s smallholder farmers are considered high risk by financial institutions and this has limited credit to these farmers which has consequently affected growth of the agriculture sector on the continent.

This fund is therefore, a major boost to the development of agriculture on the continent.

Ground Floor: Who cares about e-waste in Ghana?

2009-03-06T12:48:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

I am dedicating my column this week to the critical problem of e-waste dumping in Ghana.

There is now no doubt, that Ghana is a choice destination for dumping of e-waste from America and Europe.

Recent developments in Europe, particularly, the UK and Holland paint a very clear picture of the horror the country is confronted with.

Since I first wrote an informative article for the Daily Graphic which the newspaper published in its June 5, 2007 edition, and subsequently wrote an online version of the story drawing attention to the dangers the country could possibly be faced with in the event that we gloss over the increasing presence of health and environment threatening e-waste in Ghana, not much has happened in the country.

I have subsequently written a number of articles on the subject and still do.

Indeed, not even the media in Ghana has seen the issue as a major problem deserving of the kind of attention that it gives to some of the mundane issues we hear in the electronic media and read in the press.

The only time the media in Ghana did any coverage of the issue as it would some of the other issues of importance to it, was when a press conference was held on it or when the international media covered the issue.

Even though, I have worked for some radio stations in this country, my efforts to encourage producers and presenters to give the matter some attention did not receive any appreciable response. In one or two instances, the matter was touched but only after some other media has reported it.

As for government agencies tasked with monitoring and protecting Ghana’s environment and the health of citizens, the least said about them the better.

All the time that I have been contacted on the subject, it has been by foreign individuals, organizations or media. Most of the work and report that has been done on e-waste in Ghana, apart from those I have done and what my good friend Mike Anane has been doing, have been done by foreigners. And this leads me to ask; who cares about e-waste in Ghana?

On August 5, 2008, Greenpeace released a report on Ghana, which detailed the extent of pollution the country is exposed to due to the presence of e-waste in the country. And I found out later that, the international organization, actually followed up on my works to do their investigation.

Following that, one of the biggest publications in Germany Süddeutsche Zeitung sent down one of their editors, Michael Bitala to consult me on the subject in Ghana and he subsequently did a story which has awaken Germans to the magnitude of the problem in Ghana.

After his article, a German TV station, Proseiben flew down a crew to consult with me and did a documentary on the subject.

So far, as a journalist, I feel like a lone crusader on the subject that affects Ghana. I do feel lonely sometimes in this quest. I did not choose to, I got involved in the matter as part of my duty. I wasn’t even paid to write on the subject – I did it all as part of my regular writings on matters of local importance that have global relevance, just as I have written extensively on the global food and energy crisis, financial meltdown and the biofuels debate.

In a telephone conversation I had this morning March 6, 2009, with Dutch journalist, Weert Schenk of Volkskrant newspaper, something hit me so hard. He told me nine Ghanaians have been cited in the deadly trade of exporting e-waste from the Netherlands to Ghana.

Eight people have been arrested in the east of the country.

He told me these people have been involved in the deadly trade since 2003 or even earlier.

The eight who were arrested included three Turkish citizens and five Ghanaians, but in keeping with Dutch laws, police have not released their names to the media.

The British authorities have also arrested a man in Sussex and he has been released on bail awaiting court appearance in May 2009.

The export of e-waste from Europe is illegal and a contravention of the WEEE. The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive stipulates that Information Technology (IT) manufacturers are legally responsible for the safe disposal of their products, and are obliged to ensure all products are disposed of in an environmentally friendly manner themselves or sign up with a government-approved waste-handling firm to do it on their behalf.

These countries are acting to curtail the export of these deadly toxic chemicals into our country, and we are doing nothing about it as a country.

In an interview I had with a former deputy Minister of Environment and Rural Development, he told me specifically that there is no e-waste dumping in Ghana.

The Ghana Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has done little so far. The agency is either under-staffed or poorly resourced. The EPA told the media in April 2008 that it was setting up a committee to draft policy for handling and managing e-waste in Ghana, but nothing has happened since the announcement was made.

Each time I have called the EPA for information on the subject, they had asked me to travel to their offices before they could talk to me. This attitude simply makes nonsense of the importance of the telephone and the need to cut down on the cost of doing business.

Meanwhile, CEOs of multi-nationals and other public officials in other parts of the world would speak on the phone and answer questions on their activities.

Some Ghanaian officials would not respond to your requests for an interview even after you have fulfilled their request to send your questionnaire in advance. For months, you would not even get the courtesy of a call or an appointment.

The press office of the UK Environment Agency has been responding to my queries. An official, Scarlett Elworthy has told me the UK government is investigating specifically the dumping of e-waste in Ghana.

Our country and our people are at great risk of the dangers that e-waste poses, but there is official inaction to deal with the problem.

I formed a group on Facebook, Ghanaians Against Dumping of E-waste. Even though membership of the group is growing, most who have signed on are Ghanaians living abroad. Not many Ghanaians living at home have signed on, even though, there are lots of Ghanaians at home on Facebook.

I am doing my part, but I can’t do it all. I would however, continue to do what I have to do.

It is however time for us as a country to take decisive action to deal with this issue once and for all. Because our environment and people are in grave danger of being exposed to the cocktail of toxic chemicals that e-waste emits into the system.

The time to act is now!

UK authorities arrest man over export of e-waste

2009-03-01T02:29:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Authorities in the UK have arrested a man over the export of e-waste into developing countries.

The 46-year-old man, who was not named but identified as from West Sussex is the first to be arrested as part of ongoing crackdown on the illegal export of e-waste from Britain to the developing world, the Environment Agency (EA) of the UK has said. He was arrested on February 18, 2009 and released on bail until May 5, 2009.

The EA has also said it was increasing its efforts to intercept e-waste as it leaves Britain and had prevented 33 cargo containers of electrical goods from leaving the UK in the past six months.

Investigations by Greenpeace, an environmental group and some media, including The Independent and Sky News revealed that 23,000 tonnes of computers are being dumped illegally in Africa every year from the UK, in violation of the EU Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive (WEEE).

On Friday February 27, 2009, ghanabusinessnews.com carried a story about the arrest of a container full of e-waste at the port of Amsterdam, in Holland that was ready to be shipped into Ghana.

Ghana and Nigeria have been identified as a choice destination for e-waste or electronics waste, due to weak laws and in most cases lack of enforcement of existing regulations. Local authorities in these countries are ill-equipped and in some cases ill informed on and about the issue of e-waste.

Meanwhile, the Director of Pollutions at Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of environment has told ghanabusinessnews.com that it is time for sub-regional efforts to tackle the problem. He said the country was embarking on a clampdown of importers of unusable electronics items into the country.

E-waste is the generic name for electronic or computer wastes. These are discarded electronics devices that come into the waste stream from several sources. They include gadgets like televisions, personal computers (PCs), telephones, air conditioners, cell phones, and electronic toys.

The list can further be widened to include appliances such as lifts, refrigerators, washing machines, dryers, kitchen equipment or even air crafts.

Electronics equipment is one of the largest known sources of heavy metals, toxic materials and organic pollutants in city waste.
E-waste is known to contain dangerous chemical pollutants that are released into the atmosphere and underground water.

The modes of disposal, which include dumping old gadgets into landfills or burning in smelters, also expose the environment and humans to a cocktail of toxic chemicals and poison. These chemicals contain substances like lead, mercury and arsenic.

The cathode ray tubes (CRTs) in most computer monitors and television screens have x-ray shields that contain 4 to 8 pounds of lead, mostly embedded in glass.

Flat screen monitors that are mostly used in laptops do not contain high concentrations of lead, but most are illuminated with fluorescent lights that contain some mercury.

A PC’s central processing unit (CPU), the module containing the chip and the hard disk, typically contains toxic heavy metals such as mercury (in switches), lead (in solder on circuit boards), and cadmium (in batteries).

Plastics used to house computer equipment and cover wire cables to prevent flammability often contain polybrominated flame retardants, a class of dangerous chemicals. Studies have shown that ingesting these substances may increase the risk of cancer, liver damage, and immune system dysfunction.

Lead, mercury, cadmium, and polybrominated flame retardants are all persistent, bio-accumulative toxins (PBTs), that can create environmental and health risks when computers are manufactured, incinerated, landfilled or melted during recycling. PBTs, in particular are a dangerous class of chemicals that linger in the environment and accumulate in living tissues.

And because they increase in concentration as they move up the food chain, PBTs can reach dangerous levels in living organisms, even when released in minute quantities. PBTs are harmful to human health and the environment and have been associated with cancer, nerve damage and reproductive disorders.

Looked at individually, the chemicals contained in e-waste are a cocktail of dangerous pollutants that kill both the environment and humans slowly.

Lead, which negative effects were recognized and therefore banned from gasoline in the 1970s causes damage to the central and peripheral nervous systems, blood systems, kidney and the reproductive system in humans.

Effects of lead on the endocrine system have been observed, including the serious negative effects it has on children’s brain development. When it accumulates in the environment, it has high acute and chronic effects on plants, animals and micro-organisms.

Cadmium compounds are also toxic with a possible risk of irreversible effects on human health and accumulate in the human body, particularly the kidneys. Cadmium occurs in certain components such as SMD chip resistors, infra-red detectors, and semi-conductor chips.

Mercury on the other hand, can cause damage to various organs including the brain and kidneys as well as the fetus. More especially, the developing fetus is highly susceptible through maternal exposure to mercury.

These are only few of the chemicals used in the manufacture of electronics equipment. Other chemicals are Hexavalent Chromium which is used as a corrosion protection of untreated and galvanized steel plates and as a decorative or hardener for steel housings. Plastics including, PVC are also used. Plastics constitute about 13.8 pounds of an average computer.

The largest volume of plastics, 26% used in electronics is PVC. When PVC is burned, dioxin can be formed because it contains chlorine compounds. Barium, is a soft silvery-white metal that is used in computers in the front panel of a CRT, to protect users from radiation.

Studies have shown that short-term exposure to barium has caused brain swelling, muscle weakness, damage to the liver, heart and spleen.

Considering the health hazards of e-waste, another ubiquitous computer peripheral scrap worth mentioning is toners. The main ingredient of the black toner is a pigment commonly called, carbon black – the general term used to describe the commercial powder form of carbon.

Inhalation is the primary means of exposure, and acute exposure may lead to respiratory tract irritation.

The UK government’s action, looked at in context, should be a good sign that something practical is being done to address the issue of e-waste from the UK being dumped into developing countries.

E-waste destined to Ghana caught in Amsterdam port

2009-02-27T08:57:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

A container full of e-waste destined to Ghana has been arrested at the port of Amsterdam in Holland, according to a Radio Netherlands report Friday February 27, 2009.

The report said inspectors from the country’s environment ministry intercepted the container filled with broken electronics equipment from a major Dutch store chain, but ministry officials declined to name the store.

According to the officials, the container was filled with broken deep-frying pans, water cookers and other electronic waste in the port of Amsterdam ready to be shipped to Ghana.

According to the report, a Ghanaian exporter has bought the items without proper documentation from a trader who had bought the items from the store. The names of the Ghanaian exporter and the Dutch trader were also not given.

The report also indicated that charges would be brought against the store, trader and Ghanaian exporter.

The inspectorate reportedly has announced a crackdown on recycling companies, recycled goods shops and collectors of electronics waste which violate environmental laws.

Ghanabusinessnews.com has contacted sources in the Dutch capital, Amsterdam and will keep readers updated on developments.

Ghana and other African countries, notably Nigeria have become the dumping grounds for e-waste from developing countries, especially Europe and America.

European countries have passed the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive (WEEE Directive) to control the handling and disposal of e-waste of electronics waste. But it appears poor supervision is encouraging unscrupulous organizations and individuals to export the cocktail of poisonous chemicals into Ghana and other developing industries.

The US is one of three signatories to the Basel Convention, including Afghanistan and Haiti which have not deposed instruments of ratifications.

The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal is the most comprehensive global environmental treaty on hazardous and other wastes.

It has 170 member countries (Parties) and aims to protect human health and the environment against the adverse effects resulting from the generation, management, transboundary movements and disposal of hazardous and other wastes.

Bob Geldof believes biofuels can eradicate poverty in Africa

2009-02-23T00:39:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The biofuels debate isn’t going away anytime soon, just like the global financial meltdown, the food crisis and energy crisis, which is directly related to the surging interest in biofuels as alternative sources of energy.

There are also growing fears that the festering global financial crisis which has already impacted the eating habits of many people, coupled with the growing interest in biofuels would greatly change eating habits.
Renowned singer, philanthropist, political activist and biofuels advocator Sir Bob Geldof believes that biofuels can be developed from feedstocks without impacting food production, thereby, providing a positive impact on poverty-stricken communities by giving the opportunity to develop energy independence and eradicate poverty across Africa.

Information available to ghanabusinessnews.com say Sir Geldof is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at the World Biofuels Market 2009 to be held in Brussels from March 16 to 18.

He is expected to present the outlook for biofuels sustainability in Africa.

He says, “Africa has always used biofuel as a primary source – wood, dung, residue, etc. and can build responsibility on this tradition.”

Sir Geldof recognizes that instrumental procedures must be in place such as regulated industries, sustainable cropping in a sustainable economy, and utilizing non-arable land for non-edible crops.

He also believes that the biofuels cultivation in Africa could provide an influx of capital into the economies of African nations.

This position is however in sharp contrast with that of the UN’s top adviser on food, Prof. Olivier de Schutter. He told the BBC in May 2008 that investments in biofuels are “irresponsible”. Earlier his predecessor Jean Ziegler, had condemned biofuels calling their production a “crime against humanity” and called for an immediate ban on their use.

Ghana as a country is vigorously involved in the biofuels industry. Gold Star Biofuels, a subsidiary of Gold Star Farms Ltd., is cultivating five million acres of land in Ghana to plant jatropha for the production of biofuels for export.

In April 2008 Brazilian president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva signed an agreement with the Ghanaian government to produce sugarcane for biofuels in Ghana.

The agreement was signed while he was in Ghana for the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD XII).

During the signing ceremony, da Silva said, “in Ghana we are developing a project that will result in growing 27,000 hectares (of sugarcane) for the production of 150 million litres of ethanol per year that are destined for the Swedish market.”

And then in November 2008 a Norwegian company ScanFuel Ltd., was reported to start operations outside Kumasi in the Ashanti region to produce biofuel. The reports said ScanFuel will initially cultivate Jatropha seeds, considered high oil-yielding on 10,000 hectares of land.

The company which has a Ghanaian subsidiary, ScanFuel Ghana Ltd said its Ghanaian unit has contracted about 400,000 hectares of land, with up to 60 percent reserved for biofuel production, “not less” than 30 percent for food production and the remainder for biodiversity buffer zones.

But some analysts continue to argue that the growing interest in biofuels could negatively affect food crops production on the African continent. The argument is based on the fear that productive agriculture land could be ceded for the cultivation of crops for biofuels, and this obviously could exacerbate the food crisis.

Indeed, it is now known that with the global financial crisis, many people are changing their diets. Reports indicate that because people do not have enough money to spend on healthy meals, they have resorted to eating unhealthy foods which could potentially have adverse effects on their health.

Would aid save Africa from effects of global financial crunch?

2009-02-17T01:46:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The global food and energy crisis, and now the financial crisis are making the future of life in Africa more uncertain, especially for the poor, and Africa has been relying on aid for over 60 years now to solve its economic and development challenges. To what extent has aid worked?

The developed world has spent around 600 billion dollars on aid since 1958, and yet the number of sub-Saharan Africans living in poverty keep increasing.

Meanwhile, the full impacts of the global financial crisis is expected to hit the continent, but the extent of the effect is not known yet, making the outlook even more ominous.

Donald Kaberuka, president of the African Development Bank, said on October 7, 2008: “Although Africa is relatively protected from the initial impacts on the financial markets, the continent could be seriously affected by the weakening of global economic growth and a decline in demand for products from emerging markets… The current crisis will increase the cost of borrowing on capital markets, and make access to the markets more difficult… Budgetary pressures resulting from the various rescue plans could reduce the volume of aid and investments in Africa, and lead to rise of protectionism.”

While the banking sector on the continent has not as yet felt the spiraling effects of the global financial collapse, FDI, remittances and African economies in general are shrinking.

According to an IMF World Economic Outlook Reported of October 2008; “Economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is expected to moderate in the face of the financial turmoil and high energy and food prices… Overall growth is projected to decline from near 7 percent in 2007 to just over 6 percent 2008-2009.”

For instance in Ghana inflation for January 2009 has hit over 19% and Nigeria, the largest economy in West Africa which in 2005 paid up its external debt of $14 billion is now piling up external debt, which has so far reached $3.76 billion and inflation in that country is rising.

Ghana on the other hand received debt forgiveness. The Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative and other debt forgiveness programs canceled billions of dollars in debts and as a result, Ghana’s debt fell to around 41 percent of gross domestic product in 2006, from 70 percent of 2005.

However, high state spending deficits, partly due to measures to alleviate electricity shortages and high oil import costs, pushed government debt back up to 52 percent of GDP in 2007, according to ratings agency Standard & Poor’s – that was in June 2008.

The country is currently running a budget deficit of 13.3% of GDP.

Analysts do not think Africa can come out of the woods by depending on aid. Indeed, it is feared that even aid inflows to the continent would equally shrink as donor countries battle their own recession.

The Accra High Level Conference on Aid Effectiveness held in Accra, Ghana in September 2008 emphasised the fact that aid is not sufficient to deal with the continent’s development problems, and other factors ought to be looked at. Factors such as corruption, the strengthening of internal mechanisms and fair trade should be tackled to address the continent’s development challenges.

A large amount of aid money to the continent is siphoned into individual pockets and there are no properly established check and balance mechanisms for the use of aid money, and in instances where they exist, they hardly function effectively to make sure aid money meant for development go into these areas.

Dabansi Moyo, an economist with the World Bank is of the view that “development is not rocket science, it is very clear what works in terms of development. Africa has got lots of role models and doesn’t have to look to America and Europe, but can look to emerging economies.”

She told the BBC that Africa can do what these economies have done. “They have not relied on aid, they have gone to the capital markets, they’ve attracted trade and foreign direct investment and encouraged microfinance.” She advised that a very important factor like microfinance can be done on individual bases and “we don’t have to rely on governments to do that.”

She said further that there is no need to argue on the basis of a strong moral imperative to help Africa. She said, “We as a global society need to decide whether we want Africa to continue to be a drag on the global economy or to participate as an equal participant on the global stage?”

“If we want to see Africa and Africans as equal partners and its economies to grow, and its people to break out of the chain of poverty and grow,” she argued, “then this is the model, the model that we know works, it must be through trade, entrepreneurship, through capital market and fdi and through participation of locals, this is the model.”

She expressed concern about the fact that 60 years on Africa has no infrastructure. Most African countries are not growing because there are no entrepreneurs and the governments cannot raise the money through taxes to invest in education, health and other social services, she said.

Comparing Africa to some of the rapidly emerging economies, she said 60 years ago some of these countries were poorer than Africa. These countries she said, did not rely on aid, “they figured out what to do,”she emphasized.

“It is time for Africa to break out of the vicious aid cycle,” she said.

The global financial, food and energy crisis is not relenting anytime soon, and Africa as a continent must take a decision to move beyond aid and do the right things that have worked for other countries, especially, emerging economies of Asia, because aid won’t save the continent.

Ground Floor: Ghana’s myth-breaking Election 2008

2009-02-03T09:51:00.001-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Welcome to Ground Floor a new column on ghanabusinesnews.com. This column will discuss every topic under the sun, from the sacred to the most mundane. On the floor, the engagement would be in a no-holds-barred fashion and no subject will be treated with fear or favour.

We are taking off with a look at the recently held Election 2008 in Ghana. The election was the most historic in the country for many reasons, and it was no wonder that it broke some myths.

Ghanaians are very religious. And to quote one of Africa’s famous theologians, the Prof John Mbiti, they are “notoriously religious.” As religious people they believe in myths together with the rest of Africa and even the entire world. Because, in the sense that the elections broke some myths, the entire world was with Ghanaians.

Myth number one: The media is so powerful and can be used to do everything.

Myth number two: The National Democratic Congress (NDC) would never come back to power.

Myth number three: It is not possible for an incumbent party in Africa that has won the first round of an election to lose in a second round.

Myth number one: The media can be used to achieve anything including winning an election.

And that myth is based on a simple myth in Ghana that apart from the fact that the media is powerful, the average Ghanaian, indeed, including even the educated believe everything that comes out of the media, and as a result the Ghanaian politician built an unmatched faith in the power of the media as an influential tool. That notion was unfortunately derived from the knowledge of the Ghanaians’ gullibility – and the average Ghanaian has been gullible for a very, very long time.

Indeed, that the average Ghanaian is docile and to a large extent malleable particularly by powerful people, the Ghanaian is more likely to believe everything “a big man or woman” says in the media. And so, hapless politicians who see themselves as “big men and women” went into overdrive and decided to use or more so as I heard one politician tell someone who works on a radio station, “manipulate” the media to mislead the Ghanaian public.

Some of these politicians, went ahead to set up newspapers, radio and even TV stations with the sole aim of staying in power. And then they began to churn out lies in all ways possible using an acquiescing media much of which they had in their palms anyway. They maligned in some instances the very people they were trying to convince. The intelligence of the average Ghanaian was incessantly abused through unfettered lies, some of which were very outrageous.

Having the unfortunate and unpleasant duty of listening to these demagogues every day, all I often hear is reasoning turned upside down and good old logic yanked off the table and thrown down the Korle Lagoon

They went on and on into the election year. Steeped so deep in their own arrogance and misguided belief that falsehood sells in Ghana, one of the lies they have told so many times that I have lost count of was that the National Health Insurance Scheme was being accessed for free, but that couldn’t be true because Ghanaians pay premium. They lied about their opponents and even about one another when it suited them. And while they were at it, the greedy ones among them waddled in corruption and downright thievery.

Living with the self assured notion that the media would do everything for them the New Patriotic Party (NPP) spent all the time they had talking and talking on one radio station or the other. They seized every chance to show their faces on TV screens, even if it was for the purpose of telling another lie or painting their opponents black.

Their campaign plan hung on the media and come Election Day, they were so sure that it was a done deal. But not so - Ghanaians have become wiser. They proved them wrong and broke the myth that everything one says in the media is gospel truth – they were kicked out of power long before they knew and they are still struggling to come to terms with that reality. And to assuage their pains and shame, they have started attacking and blaming one another for losing the elections.

Myth Number two: The NDC would never some to power.

As a matter of fact, The NDC itself knew it was all over for it. The party has had such a hard time in opposition that it never believed in its own ability to come back to power, but the election must be contested any way, and so it did.

With its limited resources and battered image, the party struggled through the campaign, and to show its desperation it had to plagiarise the campaign slogan of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) and went about blatantly claiming it was its own slogan.

Not too sure of winning power, the party bid its time wearily and then as not to be expected it won power. And because the party was not too sure of winning power, it is yet to realize it is the party in power. It appears to be dazed by the reality of being elected back into power after winning with a very slim majority.

Overwhelmed by the reality, the party is already making mistakes in its very infant days in power. Some operatives of the party, refusing to acknowledge the fact that they won power because Ghanaians are law abiding and peaceful, have resorted to arbitrariness and the morbid display of naked power and lawlessness.

I understand some of the party’s operatives have started harassing some Civil Servants over their legitimate jobs. We shall be watching from the Ground Floor.

Myth number three: No incumbent party in Africa would ever hand over power to the opposition after taking the lead in a first round of voting.

Even the international community doubted Ghana’s ability to go through the second round of nail-biting elections. The second round was as tension packed as could be imagined. And then enter – Tain, the decider.

Not many expected a peaceful transition. Investors were reported to have held back their investment. Some businessmen left the country in anticipation of trouble.

I had the privilege of being invited to the New Year party of the World Bank Country Director, Ishac Diwan, at his residence. And during a conversation with a British citizen who works with the Bank, she told me in clear terms that “You Ghanaians did so well. My people would not have accepted this result, winning an election with just 40,000 votes.” She was emphatic that even in Great Britain if the results of Ghana’s elections were had there would be trouble.

I was astounded, but that was the fact. The whole world was expecting Ghana to go the way of Zimbabwe, Kenya and the rest of Africa where elections have become the reason to burn down countries.

Scanning through the media and press in Africa, I read very interesting comments about the elections in Ghana. The Ugandans are making fun of Ghana, saying it is a joke for an incumbent party in Africa to claim the opposition had rigged an election that it organized and supervised, when the NPP suggested that the NDC had rigged the elections.

The Nigerians are at it each other’s throats – some are using Ghana as an example of the best thing to have happened to democracy in Africa and calling on their greedy politicians to learn from Ghana. But there are others, who do not think that Ghana is a good example at all, claiming the elections was not devoid of irregularities.

Whatever anyone thinks, the myth has been broken, Ghana is still in one piece after a cliffhanger run-off elections.

For me the long suffering people of Ghana are the winners. They proved their sophistication and taught the politicians a life’s lesson. They have spoken, they have broken all the myths in the last elections – they decide who should rule them, they cannot put up with power drunk leeches who claim they are offering leadership.

And the NDC would not be treated differently, if they continue in their oblivion; there would always be another election year!

Determination, tenacity and hard work make successful entrepreneurs – Leanna Archer

2009-01-22T03:41:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

One of America’s teen business prodigies says the characteristics that make a successful entrepreneur are determination, tenacity, hard work and discipline.

Adding, “running a business is not about what you like, it's about what makes the customers happy,” she tells ghanabusinessnews.com in an exclusive interview via the internet.

Leanna Archer is only 13 years old and still in school at Our Lady of Providence school in Long Island, New York - she still does her home work, but she is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of her own business, Leanna’s Inc., a hair and body care company she started in 2005.

“I was eight when I initiated the idea of starting the business, it became official after I convinced my parents when I was nine,” she told ghanabusinessnews.com.

Asked how she got the idea to start her business at that tender age, she said, “I heard my parents always saying that the only way to get rich in life is to own your own business.” These words from her parents motivated her to start thinking about and eventually trying her hands at her business.

She started a business selling hair products made from a home-made recipe that her grandmother used on family members’ hair before she was born.

Leanna makes approximately $5000 monthly selling her products and she has been featured at number 12 in Inc. Magazine’s “30 under 30” entrepreneurs in America.

She has also been interviewed by most of the major media in the US, including ABC News, New York Daily and MSNBC.

On October 16, 2008, she rang the bell to open the NASDAQ Stock Market and on that day the market went up 400 points!

But Leanna didn’t have it easy starting her business.

“My very first challenge was convincing my parents that I was capable of following through on my idea to start a business,” she said.

She recounted her parents’ reaction when she told them about starting her own business. “My parents were shocked, they thought it was a phase that I would eventually get over, however they realized that I was serious when I began making efforts my self to get the license to begin.”

Leanna told us she did the research herself and found information on how to register her business. “When I gave all these information that I found on how to get the license to start, they took me serious and then they helped me to obtain the license as well as helping me to develop a website.”

“I am very grateful to them,” she says.

According to her, she needed their support in the beginning to work on structuring her days to fit school, sports, music lessons and her business. Moreover, she needed them to scale the legal boundaries for setting up her business as a teenager.

“It was also a challenge to get everyone to take me seriously because I am so young,” she added. But her tenacity and determination paid off eventually.

When ghanabusinessnews.com asked Leanna why she chose the line of business that she did, she said “I didn’t really choose the line of business, it chose me. It was like destiny. The recipe was in the family for a long time but no one thought of the idea to sell it to the public. Early on, I realized that I was marketing the original hair dressing that my mom used in my hair since I was three due to all the compliments that I was getting. That is when I became convinced that I should make it available to all.”

Admitting that she did not know much about Africa and for that matter Ghana, she gave this advice to young Ghanaians, “I’m thinking in Ghana, anyone can start a business too but as for the US, yes anything is possible but make no mistake that if it’s not for a parent or a legal guardian, starting at a very young age is not possible because of all the legal issues.

But let’s say you are 18 years of age which is still young, anyone can start a business.”

Leanna then gave the example of how she encouraged her elder brother to start his own shoe business. “After motivating my brother, he leannastarted by sketching some shoe samples, then had one made, sells it, then he had about five made, now he’s got a bunch, he was 16 at the time. You can view his shoes at www.giovhanny.com.”

“When you start a business at a young age, especially while you’re in school and living with your parents, you can start with one item, I started with nothing. I sold one jar of grease, then two etc. when I had enough money to get a business license, I did, then when I had enough money to get a website, I did, all that took time but I was in no hurry,” Leanna admonished.

“You have become famous, how do you handle your fame?” We asked her.

“To me, everything is still the same. I don’t think I’m any different than I was before my fame. I still play with the same friends. No one in my current school knew about my business and my money until they saw an article about me in a newspaper,” she answered.

The teenager born in Queens, New York, has been a motivational speaker over the years telling both children and adults about her story.

Leanna also offers advice to her customers over the phone about how to use her products. “I give my customers advice about the regimen they should follow to promote hair growth and they all take me seriously,” she says.

Leanna once wrote to say she would love to come to Ghana and talk to Ghanaian young people to motivate them. When she was asked if that plan was still on the table, she said, “my plan to visit Ghana and go to schools, churches and villages to talk to kids and adults is still the same. I’m hoping I can get an invitation either from the government or an organization that can sponsor my trip. Otherwise, when I can with my own funding I will plan the trip.”

Leanna’s hair and body care products are currently sold in shops and hair salons across the United States and online on her website www.leannashair.com.

Leanna goes to school, does her homework, travels around to give motivational talks and with her parents’ help she packages orders during the weekends and ships to her customers.

Only 13 years old, Leanna Archer has learned to succeed, and she sums up her secret in these words, “I have learned that I must remain determined and tenacious; I have to continue to have structure and discipline. I have to continue to work hard at what I do and I have to continue to listen to my customers. Running a business is not about what you like it's about what makes the customers happy.”

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Indian group's e-mail account hacked in Ghana

2009-01-17T05:26:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The Metro Film Society in Kochi, India has reported the hacking of its e-mail ID and blog by a cyber thief in Ghana.

The ID theft was detected Thursday January 15, 2009. In a story on Express Buzz, the group said one more cyber cheating in the name of people and organisations in the country by the residents of some African countries came to light on Thursday when the e-mail ID and blog of the Metro Film Society were hacked by miscreants.

The matter came to light when some of the society members received a mail in the name of M. Gopinathan, secretary of the film society, stating that he was stranded in Ghana without money.

“You need to help me with the hotel bill and I will also need $1050 to feed and help myself back home so please can you help me with a sum of $1600 to sort out my problems here? I need this help so much and on time because I am in a terrible and tight situation here,” said the mail.

The story said, the thief further asked them to transfer the money through Money Gram or the Western Union to the address Gopinathan M., Ghana (country), Accra (city) and 00233 (zip code).

The mail has also an alternate e-mail ID for them to reply, which is a usual characteristic of scam e-mails.

According to the report, some members of the group who grew suspicious over the mail enquired about the fraudulent mail and that is when the office-bearers of the society came to know about it.

The office-bearers of the society immediately sent another mail to the members stating that the society’s blog http://www.metrofilmsociety.blogspot.com and their Gmail ID metrofskochi@gmail.com had been hacked.

The mail sent by the Metro Film Society executive committee member A. P. Ramesh Babu on behalf of secretary M. Gopinathan, has asked the members to ignore such mails in future, the report said.

The society has already started the process for generating another blog and email ID.
The report inicated that the society is also planning to file a complaint before the cyber cell on the issue.

Cyber crime is a growing menace in Ghana, and reports suggest it has become the pastime of some young men in the capital Accra. Meanwhile, information available to ghanabusinessnews.com show that the security services are not up to the task in dealing with the issue.

Recently, a former Information Minister of Ghana, Dr. Benjamin Aggrey-Ntim revealed that about 82 cyber crimes occur in Ghana every month, and that is nearly one thousand crimes yearly. He said this at the 63rd Session of the Governing Council of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), in Geneva, Switzerland.

Sometime in 2008, the Member of Parliament for Dadekotopon, Nii Amasa Namoale’s e-mail account was stolen and his password changed. The thieves then sent e-mails to his contacts asking for money. He was fortunate some of the contacts called him on the phone and he clarified the matter with them.

Hotmail account users so far, have been noted to be more prone to this kind of crime. The hackers normally send emails to account users in MSN interface claiming that their accounts have exceeded their limits and would be closed unless they fill in a form which the hackers include in the mail, asking for their names, email address, date of birth, country and password. Once they get these information, they access the email account and then change the password – effectively blocking the owner from accessing his or her email account.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Mrs. Rawlings to sue former President Kufuor

2009-01-15T06:54:00.001-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The wife of former President Jerry Rawlings, Nana Konadu Agyemang-Rawlings has threatened to sue former President Kufuor for charging her before court for stealing.

Mrs. Rawlings was put before court on six corruption charges in connection with the divestiture of the Nsawam Cannery Ltd.

She was charged in 2005 for theft, embezzlement and conspiracy to defraud the state, when her husband was President.

President Kufuor on his last day in office dropped all charges against her, and following the former president’s instructions, an Accra Fast Track Court discharged her Thursday January 15, 2009.

But in a statement issued immediately after the ruling, Mrs. Rawlings has threatened to sue the former President for soiling her hard won reputation.

She accused the former president of trying to “score cheap and shameless political points with my fundamental human rights as if he owned my life,” she said.

She wondered why former President Kufuor decided to discontinue the case on his last day in office.

She accused former President Kufuor of ensuring that all members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who were put before court were sentenced. She therefore, expected to go to jail, “like a lamb being led to slaughter,” the statement said.

Mrs. Rawlings said Kufuor withdrew the case, knowing that if it continued under the NDC government, he would be exposed.

She questioned the rationale behind the decision to put her before court in the first place. She asked “if Kufuor thought there was any criminality in the purchase of the Nsawam Cannery what moral basis does he have to withdraw the charges?”

She said while the case was in court, millions of dollars have gone down the drain as she defended herself, while the project itself had been on hold, causing losses in millions of dollars to the tax payer.

“Is Kufuor going to refund all that? Would Kufuor ever be able to turn back the clock to restore to us our lost reputation?” She asked.

Mrs. Rawlings said if it was in another government, the former Attorney-General at the time would have been prosecuted for causing financial loss to the state.

She described the court action against her as an exercise in futility.

Mrs. Rawlings in the statement indicated that her legal team has been instructed to prepare a detailed report for the general public “to appreciate the disdain the previous government had for our liberties and its quest to tarnish our reputation at any cost.”

She therefore, indicated the possibility of bringing court actions against the former President and all others who she say colluded to tarnish her reputation.

Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

$5 billion invested in mining in Ghana

2009-01-11T08:57:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

More than US$5 billion have been devoted to new mining projects in Ghana in the past two decades, the President of the International Council on Mining and Metals has said.

Dr. R. Anthony Hodge, who is a leading authority on sustainable development in mining, said in an article published on the online version of the Sunday Monitor, a Ugandan publication that “during that time, the national poverty rate has fallen 12 percent.”

He said of Ghana’s 138 districts, its four mining districts have the lowest poverty levels in the country outside the capital, Accra, adding “effective disease control programmes have been a key component of this success.”

The article which appears to be a strong reaction to critics of the mining industry is titled “How to use Africa’s natural resources sustainably.”

Dr. Hodge who has worked as a professional engineer and consultant to industry and as an advisor to governments in his career cited numerous success stories in African countries where minerals are being mined.

He noted the recent honouring of former Bostwana President by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, an Africa-based good governance group.

The Foundation honoured the former Botswana President Festus Mogae with its annual Achievement in African Leadership award.

Mr Mogae has been widely praised for promoting transparency and accountability in the Botswana government. Thanks in large part to his efforts, the small African nation has evolved over the past several decades into one of the continent’s great success stories, he wrote.

He said, Botswana’s history demonstrates that a developing country’s natural resources can be a blessing for economic development and democratic reform efforts.

Botswana has a bounty of natural resources, particularly diamonds.

Its economy has grown roughly 9 percent annually since 1966, and citizens share in a substantial slice of the benefits derived from its major diamond mines.

The Botswana government has funnelled much of the revenues generated by those natural resources into public works projects, including Aids treatments, road reconstruction, and education.

The Debswana mines in Bostwana, for instance, subsidise 100 percent of the anti-retroviral therapies, infection treatments, and related monitoring for employees and their families.

These efforts have been credited with reducing Aids-related employee deaths by 13 percent between 1999 and 2005.

Dr. Hodges’ findings are as a result of research conducted by his organisation, the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM), together with host governments, international donors and civil society groups. The study he said, found that Botswana was not alone among developing countries in benefiting from its natural resources.
Mineral extraction has positively contributed to economic and political progress in nearly half of the 33 countries studied, he said.

He stated that, beyond the achievements made so far, mining companies can help kick-start growth in developing countries, and cited case studies in Ghana, Tanzania, Chile and Peru as good examples. He said the studies revealed that mining investments proved especially beneficial to nations in the midst of economic revival.

On mining companies’ contribution to Ghana’s healthcare system, he said between 2005 and 2007, in Ghana’s Obuasi district, the mining firm AngloGold Ashanti developed a malaria control programme that brought the incidence of malaria down by 73 percent - with an average monthly reduction of 4,550 cases.

He also cited the Lubombo Spatial Development Initiative — a partnership between mining company BHP Billiton, the governments of Swaziland, Mozambique, and South Africa, and local organisations – which has helped reduce malaria deaths by nearly 80 percent in southern Africa.

This initiative is widely regarded as one of the most successful public-private partnerships to control disease and drive regional economic growth, he said. Adding, such examples show that mining firms can make a significant contribution to both a country’s economic development and its social well-being.

Working in partnership, industry and governments can strengthen local land rights, erect proper protections for the environment, control disease, and ensure that revenues are channelled productively back into communities — where they can make tremendous improvements in the quality of life.

These kinds of collaborative efforts are essential to achieving the United Nations Millennium Development Goals and lifting Africans out of poverty, he suggested.

Addressing critics of the mining industry, he said, it’s rare this case is heard, of course. Critics often suggest that the mining industry takes much more from local communities than it returns. According to the “resource curse” theory, countries blessed with minerals and natural fuels are inevitably doomed to predatory governance and poverty.

Dr. Hodge is also currently Kinross Professor of Mining and Sustainability in the Department of Mining Engineering, and Helen and Arthur Stollery Professor of Mining Engineering and Geological Sciences and Geological Engineering, at Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.



Source: www.ghanabusinessnews.com

Who made third oil discovery in Ghana? Is it Tullow or Kosmos?

2009-01-08T13:29:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

News broke this morning, January 8, 2009 that a third discovery of oil has been made in Ghana. But in separate statements released by two companies in the oil industry, UK registered Tullow Oil and US based Kosmos Energy have claimed the discovery.

News organisations across the globe have carried the stories and to the uninformed on best practices in the oil industry, this looks confusing.

But in a telephone conversation with ghanabusinessnews.com Thursday evening, January 8, 2009, Greg W. Dunlevy, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer who is also a Founding Partner of Kosmos Energy cleared the air. He told ghanabusinessnews.com that Kosmos and Tullow are partners.

But when asked why neither of the two mentioned the other in their statements announcing the find, he told ghanabusinessnews.com that all the companies are public companies and they have to make the announcements in the interest of their shareholders.

He added also that, it is standard practice in the oil industry for partners involved in oil exploration to make independent announcements of finds without mentioning their partners.

Mr. Dunlevy said this third oil discovery in Ghana means that Kosmos will continue to remain in the oil and gas exploration business in the country.

Ghana Elections: Nail biting polls keep investors on edge

2009-01-02T13:49:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The stalemate in Ghana’s presidential elections is causing some anxiety among the investor community, according to a report carried by the Daily Graphic, Ghana’s leading newspaper.

The newspaper says local business owners are going through stressful times trying to convince their foreign partners to remain calm, stay in the country and keep their businesses running.

Some of the difficulties the entrepreneurs faced according to the Daily Graphic was to counter news of riots in the streets and incidents of violence in some parts of the country.

The paper quoted an anonymous consultant as saying to his German enquirer, “this is a normal political process by which we select our next leaders. This is mainly because of the closeness of the polls, which has understandably created anxiety among supporters of the two political parties.”

The two political parties contending for the very close election are the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC).

The votes likely to decide the eventual winner after two elections on December 7 and December 28, 2008 failed to elect an outright winner is ongoing at the Tain constituency in the Brong Ahafo region, Friday January 2, 2009.

The NPP have reportedly boycotted the elections, but the Electoral Commission (EC) is going ahead with the polls.

The report indicated that one foreign investor has plans of postponing his flight to Ghana for business. The investor the report said has been persuaded by the local consultant not to reschedule his flight to Ghana, which is in the middle of January to February 2009.

The local consultant was also said to have dispelled rumours that there have been a military take-over and Ghanaians are fleeing the country to neighbouring countries.

The concerns of the investor community is based on the electoral antecedents on the continent in countries like Kenya, Cote d’Ivoire and Zimbabwe.

The newspaper made reference to Ghana’s oil find. Ghana would start earning revenue from oil in 2010.

One of the companies drilling for oil in Ghana for instance, UK registered Tullow says it is focusing on exploration and development of fields in Uganda and Ghana. It intends to invest at least $3.1 billion in the first phase of its Jubilee field development in Ghana, with crude production expected to start in the second half of 2010.

According to the company’s Chief Operating Officer, Paul McDade, the company plans to pump 68,000 to 70,000 barrels of oil a day in 2008 and output is expected to stay “flat” in the next two years.

There are projections that the oil industry would create an estimated $5 billion ancillary industry.

According to the Country Leader of PricewaterhouseCoopers, Mr. Charles Egan, the concerns of the international investor community is legitimate, considering the past and recent African history, the newspaper reported.

He was also quoted by the newspaper saying, “we have to begin to do more to assure the world that Ghana presents a different case and that nothing will happen before and after the elections.”

The EC would be set to announce the results of the Tain constituency after all the votes have been counted and certified, and barring any possible legal encumbrances, it would announce the winner of the elections who would be sworn into office January 7, 2009 as the third president of the Fourth Republic of Ghana.

Ghana elections: Political parties storm Tain

2009-01-01T00:33:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

The two main political parties contesting the hottest and longest held elections ever in the recent democratic history of Ghana, have stormed Tain (pronounced Taa-in) Constituency in the Brong Ahafo region where the winner is likely to be decided. A run-off voting is due in the area Friday, January 2, 2009.

The people of the Tain Constituency were unable to vote during the run-off elections December 28, 2008 because the Electoral Commission (EC) was unable to send election materials to the area on time. And the EC Chairman, Dr. Kwadwo Afari Gyan described the incident as “circumstances beyond our control” when he announced the provisional results of the run-off Tuesday December 30, 2008 at a press conference in Accra.

Soon after the provisional results of the run-off were announced the parties got to work and headed to Tain. Indeed, the workers of the parties who had been in the area never returned to the capital. They were asked to stay there and continue with work as the results were trickling in.

The Tain Constituency is located in the Brong Ahafo region in Northern Ghana. The constituency is within the Tain District which was created in June 2004. It is situated at the North West of Sunyani (Regional Capital) and lies within latitudes 7 ½ and 8o 45` North and longitudes 2o 52` West and 0o 28` East. The District covers a land area of 4,125 sq kilometers. The capital is Nsawkaw, which is 18 miles from Wenchi, the capital of the Wenchi Municipality out of which Tain was carved from.

The district shared common boundaries with Wenchi Municipal to the East, Jaman North to the West, Sunyani Municipal to the South and Berekum Municipal to the South West.

It is also bounded by the Bole District of the Northern Region to the North East and Cote d’Ivoire to the North West.

There are 53,890 registered voters in the Tain constituency.

In the first round of voting December 7, 2008 Prof. John Atta Mills of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) polled 16,211 of valid votes cast; representing 50.75 % and Nana Akufo-Addo of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) polled 14,935 votes which is 46.75 % of valid votes cast, with the remainder going to the other political parties and independent candidate in the Constituency.

After the announcement of the provisional results of the run-off Tuesday, Prof. John Evans Atta Mills of the NDC polled 4,501,466 votes representing 50.13% of valid votes cast and Nana Akufo-Addo of the NPP garnered 4,478,411 representing 49.87% of valid votes cast.

The results put Prof. Mills ahead of Nana Addo with 23,055 votes, and having won the Tain Constituency, the expectation among many Ghanaians is that, Prof. Mills is more likely to carry the day, all things being equal.

Ghana’s growing mobile phone industry – any health implications?

2008-12-27T09:31:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Introduction

Do mobile phones really cause cancer of any kind? Is their use in any way connected with the occurrence of diseases such as leukemia and impotence?

Ghana’s mobile phone industry is growing fast. Records available from the National Communications Authority (NCA) show that mobile telephony in Ghana has exceeded 7,604,053 subscribers. And the number of mobile phone companies is growing. There are currently about six mobile phone operators licensed to do business in Ghana. Certainly, the growing number of providers will see an increase in subscription rates and accompanying increase in the number of sophisticated handsets that Ghanaians use.

Subsequently, there will be an increase in the number of base stations or transmitter towers that mobile phone companies need to be able to make subscribers make and receive phone calls.

But has the side effects of this growing and essential industry been taken into account and adequate policy made to handle them, should they occur?

Scientific evidence

Some scientists say that the technology used by the communications industry emits a type of electromagnetic radiation (EMR) that poses a health hazard to people. But local mobile phone companies, on the other hand, say, “it is only speculation.” In their view, there is no scientific fact to back the claim.

These days, mobile phones have become the most convenient mode of communication these days. And this technological advancement has turned the world into a globalised village, and Ghanaians are happily part of it. But at what costs?

For a mobile phone to send and receive calls, it must be within range of a transmitting tower. A mobile phone works just like a radio does: if you are too far from the station’s signal, your radio (or phone) cannot pick up the music (or receive a call). Radio stations, in order to transmit to a larger area erect transmission towers. Mobile phone companies also use transmission towers to relay messages to users at great distances.

The towers, and to a lesser extent, the hand sets, generate electromagnetic radiation (EMR). While most EMR is not considered to be dangerous to humans, scientific study shows that the EMR from mobile phone, radio and TV transmitter towers very likely is.

Prof. Kofi Oduro-Afriyie, a Physicist and Vice President of Central University College, Accra admits that no specific research has been done with regards to mobile phones in Ghana, but was quick to confirm that EMR is a known health hazard.

“Even though our human bodies need a certain level of radiation to survive, too much of it will cause genetic mutations, leukemia, cancer and impotence,” he said.

He explained that “electromagnetic radiation is all the more dangerous because these diseases take about 20 years before they show.”

Evidence of the danger comes from studies done in other countries. For example, the “EMFacts Information Service” a publication specialized on radiation issues in Australia, states that “although the exposure to the radiation from mobile phone towers is extremely low, the risk of cancer and other diseases is increased when the exposure is for long periods” such as for people living near these towers.

EMFacts also reports that a research team led by Dr B. Hockings found that children living within four kilometres of TV transmission towers in Sydney showed higher rates of childhood leukemia, the disease most often implicated with exposure to EMR. In fact “childhood leukemia in the exposed (closer) group was 60 per cent higher than in the control (further) group.”

In this study, the level of EMR was 1000 times lower than the Australian standard. Of great concern to researchers is that children seem to be more affected by EMR than are adults.

In other research, a 1990 study by Richard Hayes found that men who were exposed to micro and radio waves had a greater incidence of testicular cancer. A 1987 study by Dr W. Morton of the University of Oregon’s Health Science Centre, found excess cancer among people living close to radio and TV broadcast towers.

A Polish study found that soldiers exposed to EMR suffered from increased rates of leukemia and lymphoma. At the same time, Drs Henry Lai and Narendra Singh in Seattle, USA, found that exposing rats to ’safe’ levels of radiation resulted in increased breaks in the DNA of their brain cells – and damage to DNA is associated with the initiation of cancer.

Expanding networks

Whatever the health risks and associated demands on Ghana’s health budget, the mobile telephony companies are here to make profit, and they won’t be the ones paying the hospital bills, so what do they have to lose?

Ghana’s trade liberalization policy, linked with a desire to strengthen the private sector, the zeal to open the country’s doors for Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) has opened the door to a proliferation of private phone, radio and TV companies.

These companies are employing aggressive and competitive marketing strategies, they have together won millions of Ghanaians. With the growing demand for more services, the number of transmission towers will multiply, and they are, on a daily basis. These expansions are being pursued without considering the possible health hazards associated with the EMR these towers pour into their surroundings.

And these days, it is not uncommon to see cell sites and transmission towers sited in densely populated areas, and these apart from the dangers of radiation do pose physical dangers to residents. A recent incident in Tema where a transmission tower collapsed over a building during rainstorms is an example.

In some instances, residents have gone to court to stop mobile phone companies from erecting transmission towers in their communities, citing possible side effects of radiation on their health as reasons.

Contrary evidence

The mobile phone companies appear unconcerned. For them profit is everything. To them the issues that are being raised by scientists are speculations with no real proof. And of course evidence exists elsewhere showing that some very influential mobile telephony companies have commissioned scientific researches of their own that have shown proof to the contrary – that there are no dangers to health from using mobile phones.

To achieve their lofty targets and maximize profits, the mobile phone providers are “extolling the benefits and denying the risks, in spite of mounting scientific evidence to the contrary. In the face of these challenges, what should be done in Ghana? What national safety standards should be set to regulate EMR emission levels?

Regulating the industry

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the agency responsible for regulating the environmental activities of businesses, has not identified the mobile phone companies as having a significant impact on the environment. According to an EPA insider, mobile phone companies are required to register with the EPA but not to submit Environmental Impact Assessments before they commence business. And there have been instances where some of the companies have gone ahead to erect transmission towers without permission from the EPA and have been asked to pull these down after residents have drawn the attention of the EPA.

The Ghana Standards Board (GSB) has likewise not considered setting standards for mobile phones. A source stated that they respond to the immediate needs of the country and that when a need is identified, they are willing to work on it. If faced with the evidence, they will study it and set up a technical committee to come out with standards.

The National Communications Authority (NCA), seems to simply give licenses for mobile companies to operate. They even lack the necessary clout to get these companies to meet the requirements for their operations such as providing quality services for their subscribers.

Until recently, when the NCA showed that it has got teeth, it has always been seen as a toothless bulldog. It opened wide its mouth to bring some sanity into the industry by ordering two of the service providers to clean-up their acts. They also ordered the two companies to halt any further signing on of new subscribers until they improved their services.

But it is yet to be seen, whether they can really bite, because, there is strong suspicion among Ghanaians that the companies are still increasing their subscriber base even after the directive.

Benchmarks for radiation control

Ghana can take a cue from other countries of the world that already have permissible levels of radiation emission.

Countries, like the USA, Britain, New Zealand and Australia, have set national standards to prevent high levels of electromagnetic radiation and the resulting illnesses in their citizens.

The situation in Ghana, which has no EMR safety standards, is all the more disturbing because the mobile phone companies doing business here have not taken precautions to protect their customers.

For example, salesmen of some of these companies are themselves unaware of the safety issues of mobile phone usage. When asked about what they tell customers, they simply said, ‘we tell our customers not to use the phone often - because it is expensive.”

Another salesman said he advises his customers to get a leather jacket for their phones and to carry them somewhere other than a breast pocket to minimize the health dangers such as cancer.

However, one marketing manager ruled these out as safety measures, insisting that they only advise customers to get leather jackets to prevent scratches on the phone.

About 20 mobile phone users who were interviewed confirmed they have only been taught how to use the phones, nothing more. Nothing was mentioned to them by company employees about health dangers associated with mobile phone usage.

Lack of adequate information

The communications companies would like their customers to believe that there is no health controversy. Neither would they like the people who are living and working near their transmission towers to question the effects of the electromagnetic radiation these towers give off.

However, in other parts of the world, the controversy rages on and for us in Ghana, the emerging facts about the issues can be looked at carefully in our context.

Looking at our Ghanaian situation, where we have limited, if not zero resources to handle the ill effects of electromagnetic radiation, to be forewarned is to be forearmed.

It is our duty to inform our people, so they can make informed choices.

It was nine years ago when I first raised the flag, but no one seemed to have seen it.

Dr Bockings, the Australian Researcher, recommended then, that, “it would be prudent for some countries to set up perspective epidemiological cancer studies of possible effects of mobile phones -both base stations (transmission towers) and hand held units - so that in 10 years we have some answers.”

This advice was given in 1998. Tens years on, nothing concrete has happened.

I hope government would initiate moves with environmental groups and research institutions; with funding from the mobile phone, radio and TV companies, to conduct studies to establish the facts concerning the possible health hazards associated with communications technologies, so that at least, in Ghana, the tide of the cases of cancer, leukemia and impotence can be stemmed, to prolong the lives of our people.

Ghana's mysterious 'Big Tree'

2008-12-20T07:41:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

There is a tree which stands at 90 metres in height and 396 centimetres in diameter. According to Ghana’s Forestry officials, it is the biggest tree in the country.

Growing in the forests of Akim Oda in Ghana’s Eastern region, the tree known locally as “the Big Tree” is of the Bako species and its botanical name is tieghemela heckle.
The sheer size and height of the tree leaves so many local people in awe making them deify it. It is a mystery to them, and believing it must have some supernatural powers, they regularly visit the tree carrying gifts and sacrifices.

Many have dug holes around the giant roots of the tree where they leave their sacrifices with prayer requests for good fortune.

“The Big Tree” does not only serve the curiosity of local people, it is also a tourist attraction.

Mining in Ghana – paradox of profits, pollutions and poverty

2008-12-18T03:59:00.000-08:00

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi

Mining in Ghana has been going on for over 100 years now. And 100 years of any business venture is long enough to show visible signs of progress and understandably positive returns, both economically and socially.

But whatever benefits mining in Ghana has brought the country, can best be seen mostly in the mining entities. Not even Ghana as a nation can boast of any appreciable return on investments in mining, having invested lands, people and to some extent the humanity of some of its people including their culture and traditions.

The mining companies rake in huge profits from their activities in Ghana. For in stance, in 1995 a mining company operating in one of Ghana’s mining towns made a profit after tax of US$105 million.

The mining sector in Ghana earned an unbelievable US$ 2,099.43 million in 1999. But these huge earnings were made at the expense of lives and property belonging to ordinary Ghanaians whose peaceful and subsistent lifestyles had to be sacrificed on the altar of national economic expedience. But these benefits in terms of their national dimensions remain, ever questionable.

What is however, interesting about the contribution of mining to the national economy shows glaringly when it is compared to the agriculture sector.

Between 1993 and 1997 mining contributed just 1.5% to Ghana’s GDP as against agriculture’s 40%.

It is estimated for instance, that since 1985 Ghana has attracted external investment in the gold sector alone to the tune of over US$ 3.2 billion in new mine development and expansion.

Despite these huge figures, it is widely believed that only about 10% of the value of gold comes to the country.

Unlike agriculture though, the mining sector is spiced with so much incentives for investors, making it the most attractive and lucrative sector to invest in.

But strangely, Ghana is an agricultural country. However, the country doesn’t seem to pursue a vigorous agriculture expansion programme, at least not for the moment.

Mining as a sector, makes minimum contribution to employment and offers very high wages than the local average. Yet less than 8% of Ghanaians are in formal employment in the mining sector.

Meanwhile, over the last decade, mining has significantly added to the country’s ecological destruction amounting to around 7% of the country’s GDP.

Enter any mining community in Ghana, and what hits you right in the face is abject poverty.

The first middle aged man you are likely to meet might look older than his actual age. He is obviously hit, knocked about and tossed around by poverty. He is listless, and despondent. He might also be suffering from a disease resulting from mining pollution.

These people strut around hopelessly in their native lands, and they are typical examples of casualties resulting from the uncontrollable urge and penchant for profits by mining companies.

These companies have the unflinching support and backing of the governments in power. They needlessly carry on their operations with impunity and gross disregard for human life and right to property.

I have had the privilege of working in some mining communities in Ghana. It is not only appalling poverty and resignation that greets you, but also grim pessimism of local people.

While we are it, every year government declares how much profit the country has earned from mining activities. But even then, the suspicion among mining industry watchers is that, government does not declare the true figures. The figures that governments declare are not the true reflection of how much is made from the venture.

Royalties that are paid to stools in these communities hardly reach their intended target, but no one cares. To most of the people in charge, it is only important that the royalties are paid. They care less if any one benefits from the income. This meager royalty that is paid to local people is supported by laws, laws that seem to only favour the multi-nationals and protect their supreme interest for profits.

A few individuals are believed to pocket royalties meant for communities. And often these monies are shared in phony contracts of some sorts. Some of the roads and schools that are constructed from these monies do not last, because they are hurriedly and poorly constructed to cover up the greed and corruption of the few soulless individuals for whom the majority are a bunch of weak ignoramuses whose plight one must exploit to make some money.

The effects of mining on Ghana as a nation have been downplayed over the years. The profits are used to placate a restless populace. We are told to shut up when some of us want to cry foul and demand proper accountability.

Interestingly, for the most part, some of the people who speak for the mining companies are powerful fellow Ghanaians. They are catered for very well by these mining companies, their heels are well oiled. They are often noble Ghanaians who have spoken so loud about equality, justice and a fair country for all some time past, but they have suddenly turned coat and joined the powerful miners.

And when they do, they unleash on the rest of us a cacophony of raucous tunes that persistently jar our ear drums. They do these with unmatched alacrity in impeccable Queen’s English, making the rest of us look like less mortals, who must acquiesce and believe everything they are telling us.

But all that glitters is not gold. It is not all that is said in faultless English that is the truth.

Agriculture in Ghana has suffered the most palpable neglect and slow development including the adoption and adaptation of modern technology.

And that is not withstanding the fact that the agriculture sector is the single most important sector of the country’s economy. The sector employs about 70% of all Ghanaians employed in the country and contributes about 40% to GDP.

It is the main source of sustenance for the country. But mining is favoured against agriculture.

So many cocoa farmers have had to reluctantly give up their ancestral farmlands spanning four to five generations to mining companies. It is usually the case that when mining companies acquire a land in a community for prospecting, that local farmers are required to abandon their farms. They are paid some compensation, though, but these compensations never meet any economic or moral requirement for such huge losses.

Pittances are paid to these farmers and their cocoa trees and other crops are destroyed to make way for mining.

That would not be the end. And once the mining itself begins, there appears more serious challenges to contend with. The modes of operation of these mining firms dispose most residents to health and environmental risks.

Usually, these companies involve in surface mining instead of the better option of underground mining. They do because surface mining is cheaper.

The process of gold mining involves the blasting of rocks, which is accompanied by deafening noises, vibration of the ground which sends dust and particles in the air and water.

To extract gold, toxic chemicals such as cyanide, arsenic, sulphur dioxide are used and other gases are produced with serious health consequences - these chemicals leak into underground sources of drinking water, exposing local inhabitants who most of the time lack potable drinking water to danger.

Local people might drink water from poisoned streams or even eat fish from polluted rivers.

Large craters resulting from blasting are left to collect stagnant water, and these breed mosquitoes leading to high incidents of malaria in these areas, part of which the country spends over US$77 million yearly to treat. Skin diseases and diarrhea are common in these areas.

Following in tow are sexually transmitted diseases, pulmonary tuberculosis, acute conjunctivitis, poverty and a rising crime rate.

The pull factors of mining communities are not only the lure of gold, but also the attraction for other jobs, which are often non-existent.

Prostitution is very common in these areas also because not only do both men and women troop there to grab a share of the hard cash that is to be made, but even local women and girls whose husbands and fathers have lost their sources of livelihood, which used to be the farmlands they once owned, tend to become merchants of the flesh. They are both compelled and attracted into the sex trade.

The cost of living in these areas is so high because there is expatriate money to be made, and local people are forced to live like paupers in their own land.

They fall prey to all kinds of NGOs who hold claim to their salvation. While some of these groups are genuine and they fight relentlessly for the rights of these people, there are charlatans among them who feed fat on the misfortune of local people like leeches.

They sometimes exaggerate the real issues without particularly having a good understanding of the situation on the ground. They make so much noise and in some cases they even attract the attention of the international community. But in the end, they benefit at the expense of the victims of mining.

Local people are dispossessed, displaced and divided. The few who know what ‘is good’ for them betray the majority and side with the merciless exploiters.

As we all watch in dismay, some mining companies play the corporate responsibility card and win a few favours and applause from the absent minded crowd who only watch at a distance, but see only these ‘kindness’ of the mining companies.

In any case, should we as a country continue to favour mining at the expense of agriculture? When in reality the mining industry has a very short life span? When all the deposits are mined, the mines close down and often the towns and villages are deserted turning them into ‘ghost’ towns.

What are often left behind are degraded lands that can not be reclaimed or farmed on, and with these, a dark cloud of uncertainty, pollutions, poverty and even death.