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A monthly newsletter of CountrySTAT Ghana

Editor: Assistant Editor:Contributors:

Emmanuel Kpakpo BrownEmmanuel Kpeglah

Francis Dzah Samuel Oku Bright Atiase

Editorial Team

Issue 4 June - July 2010

28 February roadMinistries enclaveP. O. Box 1098, Accra, GhanaTel: +233 0244 976646/0208760070E-mail: emmanuel.brown@statsghana.gov.gh/ kpemal@yahoo.com

The Food and Agricultural Organisation's office in Accra (FAO) has launched an international campaign against hunger in Ghana.

Dubbed: "The One Billionhunngry Campaign", the programme highlights the growing problem of global hunger, which now affects more thanone billion people worldwide.

The aim of the campaign is to act as a reminder to world leaders to eliminate global hungerand deliver the L' Aquilla statement on food security by scaling up investments inagriculture and addressing the root causes of hunger and poverty.

Launching the campaign in Accra, Mr Musa Saihou Mbenga, Deputy Regional Representative for Africa, said world leaders gathered in L' Aquila in July 2009 and signed a joint statement on food security, which was endorsed at the World Summit of Food Security in November 2009.

He said the leaders had agreed on five principles to reduce hunger and increase investment in agriculture people worldwide continued to go hungry on a daily basis through country-owned plans, among others, and the role of and the UN had agreed to the target of reducing the number the FAO was to speak for the hungry, since over a quarter of by half in 2015.a billion people in Africa currently suffered Mr Mbenga said boosting Africa's food production from malnutrition and 30 per cent of Africans faced hunger. had been a major cause of concern for

He said the worst hit areas were in Central and governments and regional institutions in their efforts to Eastern Africa with food crisis linked to conflicts occurring in achieve food security.the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia and Ethiopia in He said, however, issues such as rural poverty, addition to a worsening food crisis in Niger which had investment in the agriculture sector andincreased the number of people affected in the Sahel. marketing constraints had also been highlighted as posing

The Country Representative said the, one billion serious challenge• to hungerhungry campaign was launched worldwide by the FAO on, reduction.May 11,2010 and it was a carefully orchestrated drive to He said the FAO operated throughout the region, attract one million signatures to a petition calling on alleviating hunger and building thenational and international leaders to - move hunger onto the capacity to develop, adding that regional support top of their political agenda. programmes to reduce hunger included the recently

He said the signatures were intended to be implemented ED Food Facility programme, which was symbolically presented during World Food Day observances operational in 16 countries, as well as the special at the UN headquarters in New York in the fall of 2010. programme for food security in 35 countries across Africa.

He said hunger, a quiet crisis, was barely in the news yet current calculations showed that close to one billion

FAO Launches Campaign Against Hunger

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.

Hundreds of hectares of farmlands were submerged in the Keta Municipality by the recent floods destroying food crops worth several thousands of Ghana cedis.

About 100 acres of maize farms belonging to Farmer Based Organizations that received support under the Millennium Challenge Authority (MCA) Project at Anloga were among the crops affected.

Togbe Azadagli III, Keta Municipal Director of Agriculture told members of the National Task Force on Floods during a visit to the area on Saturday.

The Task Force, which toured flooded areas in the Keta Municipality and Ketu-South District, was led by Mr Joseph Lagoon to enable it to absorb more water to minimize the Yileh Chireh, Minister of Local Government and Rural extent of floods in the Keta area.Development. He called for more MCA support for the farmers to

Togbe Azadagli said the farmers received GH¢76,525 enable them to grow vegetables when the floods recede in of MCA support in terms of fertilizers, seeds and land August.preparation. Mr Kofi Portuphy, National Coordinator of the The team also visited Vodza, Kedzi and Anyanui areas National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO) in the Keta Municipality and Adina Denu and Agbozume in the expressed the need for the development of appropriate Ketu-South District.infrastructure in support of projects. Mr Yileh Chireh noted that the devastation caused by

He observed that the floods would have been floods in the area was extensive and had given new lessons in prevented in the farms if drainage was considered at the culvert designing and the height or thickness of roads. He said planning stage of development. Mr Sylvester Tornyeava, Keta there was the need to revive communal spirit, which had died Municipal Chief Executive, called for the dredging of the Keta down in communities.

Mr. Oppong-Ababio told the flood victims to exercise The Sunyani Municipality was on Friday night hit by a restraint whilst the assembly and the NADMO arranged some torrential rain that flooded some parts of area and cut off a relief items for them.number of cocoa growing communities from the He assured the people that the municipal assembly municipality. would liaise with the Department of Feeder Roads to re-gravel

The affected communities are Subonpam, Asamoah the Adidease-Atuahenekrom road to facilitate movement of shell, Agyapongkrom, Agya Yanti, Alhaji Akuraa, Asuogya, the farmers and their economic activities.Besiese, Adidease among others. Mr. Lampo told GNA that some communities

The roads linking the communities to Atuahenekrom, including Atronie, Kotokrom, Baakoniaba and Yawsen in the the only nearby marketing centre, had become impassable municipality were also flooded.whilst quantities of cocoa beans and other food stuffs had At Adidease, Mr. Kwakye Mensah, a farmer told the stuck in farms. GNA that floodwaters had submerged all the wooden bridges

River Amoma, the main river in the area, overflowed over River Amoma in the area.its banks and farmers as well as school children could not "We can neither go to our farms to fetch food stuffs move in or out of some of the communities. nor to the market to buy food items", he said, and appealed to

Mr. Kwasi Oppong-Ababio, Municipal Chief Executive, rebuild the bridges.Mr. Kwasi Lampo Municipal Coordinator of National Disaster Madam Adwoa Pokuaa, a cocoa farmer, expressed the Management Organisation (NADMO) and Mr. James Nunoo, fear that if immediate steps were not taken their houses Municipal Engineer, visited some of the communities on would be flooded and appealed to the municipal assembly to Wednesday to assess the situation. build gutters along the road that links the community to

At Subonpam, residents told the Ghana News Agency Atuahenekrom.that a 16- year-old Junior High School pupil nearly got drowned in the river when he attempted to cross it to attend school atAtuahenekrom on Tuesday.

Recent Floods Destroy Hundreds of Hectares of Farmlands in Keta

Widespread Floods Hit Sunyani and its Environs

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MOFA Launches new Regulations for the Fishing Industry

The first ever Fisheries Regulations, 2010 (L.I. 1968), toprovide interpretation of technical expressions associatedwith the fishing industry and enable operators learn andappreciate their meanings for compliance, has been launched in Accra.

The new regulations, would in addition set clear parameters for the regulator to manage the industry on a more sustainable basis and for operators to appreciate their obligations, rights and responsibilities for a successful management of the industry for the country’s socioeconomicdevelopment.

Mr. Kwesi Ahwoi, Minister of Food and Agriculture (MOFA), launched the regulations and said an interpretation section had been added to explain the several scientific and technical words used in the Regulations for easy rigours of the law”, he added.understanding and compliance by stakeholders. The Sector Minister said the Ghana Navy and the

He explained that though there was an Act, it had Police as well as other law enforcing agencies had been some difficulties encountered by managers and regulators of empowered to arrest and prosecute any offender to serve Fisheries since 2002 when the Fisheries Act 625 was as a deterrent to others.promulgated by Parliament. Mr. Mike Akyeampong, Chairman of Fisheries

Some of the challenges were inadequate Commission outlined the numerous contributions made by specification of required procedures for the acquisition of the fisheries sector and commended government for the licenses and permits for fishery activities, inadequate legislative instrument that would serve as a guide to sanctions against offenders, inadequate documentation of regulate and manage the development of the industry.the meaning of technical language in fisheries, non-detailed He noted that the new Regulations were in tune specification of legal and illegal practices in the capture with modern trends and urged stakeholders in the fishing fisheries and aquaculture and non detailed specification of industry to be abreast of the regulations and abide by them.responsibilities of vessel operators in the marine environment.

The new regulations would cover fishery and fishing vessels, fishing nets, fishing devices and fishing, fishing equipment, fishing license, compliance measures, monitoring mechanisms and aquaculture.

Mr. Ahwoi noted that efforts would be made to translate the Regulations into the main Ghanaian languages for the understanding of the wide section of the population in the fishing industry.

“Ignorance they say is not an excuse before the law therefore anybody who violates the law would face the full

The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation (CTA), has begun a four-day national training workshop on information sharing for agricultural and rural-based development institutions and research organisations.

The workshop, which is in partnership with the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is designedto expose the about 30 participants to new tools and services available on the Internet for content development and knowledge dissemination.

Mr Michael Hailu, Director-General of CTA, said the goal is to provide a forum for dialogue and exchange

of information, among organisations and professionals in the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries.This, he said, would help to enhance their technical capacity for effective management of agriculture, through the availability

and access to accurate, timely and well-researched information.The expectation, he said, was that the participants would have better understanding and grasp of internet applications for

information retrieval, collaborative generation of content and cost-effective communication.The participants are being trained in the use of internet "Blogs", "Wikis", "You Tube", "Google documents", "RSS feeds",

"Google maps" and "Skype".

National Training Workshop on Agriculture Information