Environmental sanitation is a key issue that when properly tackled adds to the value of the country and Ghana is no exception.
Following the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufu-Addo’s Jamestown declaration that he was going to make Accra the cleanest city in the whole of Africa, sanitation and waste management have become a priority and the most talked about topic among Ghanaians.
As a democratic republic of almost 30 million people, Ghana is one of the most urbanized countries on the African continent. The capital Accra has become a cosmopolitan city with Kumasi, Takoradi and Tamale following closely. In 2015, the World Atlas established that, half of the Ghanaian population lived in towns and cities and this rapid urbanization poses many challenges with sanitation being the most teething problem.
But UNICEF suggests there is no clear urban basic sanitation strategy and plan in Ghana which is contrary to a 50-years environmental sanitation plan put in place by the Jospong Group of Companies (JGC) owners of waste management giant Zoomlion Ghana Ltd. Also, various approaches and interventions in urban basic sanitation are quite not effectively coordinated and monitored with the private sector being the key players led by Zoomlion in the industry.
Bad sanitation practices and negative human attitudes towards waste and sanitation have yielded more problems and dangers against the nation and yet Government of Ghana the custodian of waste in the country have done very little to address the menace. There is insufficient collaboration and no deliberate attempt by government to push the private sector to heights whereby the waste problems can finally be brought to controllable limits.
On the 15th of August 2019, the Kpone Landfill in Tema in the Greater Accra Region caught fire and for six weeks running the fire is yet to be put off which has resulted in the landfill being closed down. This and consistent complaints made to Members of Parliament by constituents and Civil Society Groups triggered jointly three Parliamentary Select Committees of Sanitation and Water Resources, Local Government, Works and Housing and Environment, Science and Technology to touch base with the problems in the four metropolitan areas namely, Kumasi, Accra, Tamale and Takoradi with a tour to ascertain the magnitude of the problem. They visited landfills and some key private waste management facilities in the aforementioned metropolis.
Kumasi
The four-day tour began in Kumasi and the MPs were received by the Ashanti Regional […]
