Page 8 - AfrElec Week 09 2022

AfrElec POLICY AfrElec

Ghana’s President

launches new phase of

Green Ghana Project

GHANA PRESIDENT Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo development and urged Ghanaians to protect
has launched a new phase of the Green Ghana the forest for the benefit of the current genera-
Project, announcing plans for the planting of tion and their posterity, according to GNA.
20mn trees in 2022 within the framework of “A greener future is necessary for the sur-
broader efforts to restore lost forest cover and vival of our planet, and we must do all we can to
contribute to the fight against global climate bequeath to future generations a greener, better
change, GNA has reported. planet,” he said while appealing to Ghanaians
In a ceremony marking the launch of this and foreign residents to join the campaign.
ambitious campaign on Tuesday (March 1), Ghanaian authorities launched the first phase
the president said that his administration was of the project in June 2021. Since then, a total of
stepping up efforts to reduce deforestation and about 7mn trees have been planted nationwide.
restore degraded landscapes across the country. Half of the trees slated for planting within the
This afforestation will help “guarantee our sur- framework of the project will be planted in forest
vival,” he declared. reserves that have been degraded as a result of
Akufo-Addo also described the forest as degraded such as, GNA said.™
a key resource for Ghana’s socio-economic

Ghana must take cautious

approach to energy transition

GHANA ACCRA should not adopt decarbonisation as articulated by President [Nana] Akufo-Addo
policies so strict that they limit options for the in Glasgow, Scotland during the COP26 con-
development of Ghana’s hydrocarbon resources, ference,” he said, referring to the event held last
Deputy Energy Minister Andrew Egyapa Mercer autumn.
said on March 1. The deputy minister also emphasised that
Speaking at a town hall event in Takoradi, he Africa was currently the smallest source of car-
declared that Ghana risked seeing its crude oil bon dioxide emissions in the world, on a conti-
and natural gas assets becoming stranded if it nental scale, and called for the energy transition
took an overly rigid approach to reducing car- to be a fair process for low-, middle- and high-in-
bon dioxide emissions. While climate change come countries alike.
poses a genuine risk to the world, Mercer said, “[It] would be wholly unfair for the world to
Accra cannot ignore the possibility that emis- demand that Africa abandons the exploitation
sions reduction policies may harm the national of our resources needed to finance her develop-
economy.. ment and help us to cope better with the threat
“The objectives of a National Energy Transi- of climate change, at a time when many coun-
tion Plan should ... take into consideration the tries on the continent have just discovered them,”
peculiar circumstances of Ghana’s abundant Mercer commented.™
natural resources and her development needs,

P8 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 09 03•March•2022