The Deputy Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, responsible for Lands and Forestry, Hon.Benito Owusu-Bio has on Friday, November 18, 2022, hosted a three- member delegation from the High Commission of Canada led by the Counsellor and Head of Cooperation, Ms. Kathleen Flynn- Dapaah.
The meeting was to familiarise with the operations of the Ministry and deliberate on ways of growing the Ghanaian economy.
Discussions mainly focused on how the two countries can contribute to the protection of the environment through forest conservation practices as well land reservation to improve livelihoods.
The Deputy Minister explained that collaboration between Ghana and Canada can be intensified through their investments in Government’s policy initiatives that aims at enhancing livelihoods of illegal miners.
He advocated policies like the National Alternative Employment and Livelihood Programme (NAELP) which he explained are created to address issues of illegal mining which affects investors and operations of mining responsibly in the country.
Ms. Flynn- Dapaah in her remarks said her country is ready to support Government’s efforts in improving livelihoods, and Youth employment, saying that they fall in line with projects of building capacity for the Youth.
Commending Government’s Afforestation programme, Green Ghana Project, the Head of Cooperation added that Canada will carefully consider strategies to support Ghana’s policies interventions coupled with ensuring responsible business practices.
On Forestry, Mr. Joseph Osiakwan, Technical Director for Forestry at the Ministry added the Ministry under the umbrella of Government has implemented practical forest and nature solutions like the Land Scape restoration project, Redd+ and others to improve livelihoods.
Touching on the Lands sector, Mr. Maxwell Adu-Nsafoa , Technical Director for Lands, also underscored policies in place which captures the interest of Land owners , stressing that the new land administration system will have security tenure while the New land Act has taken cognisance of all structure of interest in all land issues.
Source:Kwabena Nyarko Abronoma
