A TWO-DAY capacity building workshop to equip various professionals with communication skills to enable them to contribute to the successful implementation of the Urban Transport Project in the country ended in Koforidua last Friday.
The workshop drew about 60 public relations officers, surveyors, marketers, among others, working at the Urban Passenger Transport units of 10 metropolitan and municipal assemblies in the country.
They were equipped with the rudiments of effective communications management, media and public relations skills to enable them to effectively communicate with different stakeholders in the transport industry.
They were drawn from the Urban Passenger Transport Unit offices of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA), the Tema Metropolitan Assembly, as well as the Ledzorkuku, Krowor, Ga East, Ga West, Adenta, Ashiaman, Ejisu and Weija Municipal assemblies, who would be implementing the project on a pilot basis.
It was organised by the Urban Transport Project and facilitated by the Staurus Training Ghana.
Addressing the participants at the opening ceremony, the Head of Communications and Public Relations of the Urban Transport Project, Mr Kwadwo Antwi, said the implementation of the project was aimed at improving urban mobility and dealing with traffic and congestion in towns and cities.
Under phase one, he said, the government would give priority to providing the necessary infrastructure such as the construction of bus lanes from Mallam to the central business district of Accra and high occupancy vehicles and buses to facilitate the movement of the people.
“To this end, the government, in implementing the project ,is constructing a road from Mallam to the central business district and providing dedicated special bus lanes to reduce the long hours commuters spend moving from one place to another”, Mr Antwi said.
He was hopeful that the successful implementation of the project would encourage Ghanaians to “move from their private vehicles into these buses and commute to any destination without the delays and other hindrances often encountered on our roads”.
A resource person from the Staurus Training of Ghana, Mr Graham Rose, an international consultant and trainer in communications and advertising, educated the participants on the need to effectively package their message using the appropriate communication medium to reach the desired target audience.
That, according to him, would enable them to effectively and efficiently communicate the immense benefits of the project and solicit the support and co-operation of the public.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
PRODUCTS OF TERTIARY INSTITUTIONS MUST BE CREATIVE (PAGE 11, NOV 25)
THE challenge facing the country’s development is not the absence of human resource but how to expose the available human resource to opportunities that need creative undertakings to solve problems to improve the lot of the people.
Professor Alfred A. Oteng-Boateng, a former Deputy Director of the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) who made this statement said the country needed young entrepreneurs with creative abilities to come up with innovations that would boost the country’s development aspirations.
He, therefore, has challenged products of tertiary institutions in the country not to only acquire the requisite knowledge and skills but to be creative to enable them to contribute meaningfully to the country’s socio-economic development.
“The purpose of your education as products of universities has been to expose you to knowledge that has opened you to capacity to be innovative and use your mind to create something from an existing entity in order to benefit society,” Prof. Oteng-Boateng said.
He was speaking at the matriculation and the fourth convocation of the All Nations University College (ANUC) at Koforidua.
The event saw the admission of 472 students to pursue various programmes and the graduation of 360 students out of which nine had first class.
According to Prof. Oteng-Boateng, the debacle of the 2008 global financial downturn had posed serious global economic upheaval to almost all economies across the world.
This unfortunate situation, he said, required the government to pursue good economic policies to overcome the effects of the global financial crisis in the areas of poverty, severe hunger, urbanisation, violence, diseases and depletion of both renewable and non-renewable natural resources.
“The success of such a policy demands the availability of a certain cadre of human resource that understands what it takes to make an economy tick and contribute to sustainable social and environmental development of the country,” he stated.
More than ever before, he noted that Ghana needed people with creative abilities to come up with innovative inventions that would boost agricultural practices to enhance food security, promote safe and efficient exploitation of the mineral wealth of the country and address environmental degradation, among others.
Speaking on the topic “Science and Technology Education in Nation Building”, the President of ANUC, Dr Samuel Donkor said in a world dominated by technology, access to knowledge was more important than access to natural resources and capital, saying advances in science and technology had affected every sphere of human life, from education, transport, communication, commerce, employment and many others.
According to him, unlike the past, countries like Japan and others with limited natural resources had evolved into dominant economies by focusing on science and technology which had been their engine of economic and social development.
“These countries including India can boast of a reasonably strong educational, research, pharmaceutical, industrial infrastructure, space technologies and automobiles”, Dr Donkor said.
He indicated that it was the immense advantage of technology to the country’s socio-economic development that the ANUC had deliberately chosen science and technology based education to prepare the youth to look into the future with confidence and contribute to nation-building.
“But we must not forget that the fast changing technologies of today often make skills redundant unless a continuous programme of skill upgrading is taken. Education can no longer be limited to the days of university but has to be a continuous exercise,” he reminded the graduands.
Professor Alfred A. Oteng-Boateng, a former Deputy Director of the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) who made this statement said the country needed young entrepreneurs with creative abilities to come up with innovations that would boost the country’s development aspirations.
He, therefore, has challenged products of tertiary institutions in the country not to only acquire the requisite knowledge and skills but to be creative to enable them to contribute meaningfully to the country’s socio-economic development.
“The purpose of your education as products of universities has been to expose you to knowledge that has opened you to capacity to be innovative and use your mind to create something from an existing entity in order to benefit society,” Prof. Oteng-Boateng said.
He was speaking at the matriculation and the fourth convocation of the All Nations University College (ANUC) at Koforidua.
The event saw the admission of 472 students to pursue various programmes and the graduation of 360 students out of which nine had first class.
According to Prof. Oteng-Boateng, the debacle of the 2008 global financial downturn had posed serious global economic upheaval to almost all economies across the world.
This unfortunate situation, he said, required the government to pursue good economic policies to overcome the effects of the global financial crisis in the areas of poverty, severe hunger, urbanisation, violence, diseases and depletion of both renewable and non-renewable natural resources.
“The success of such a policy demands the availability of a certain cadre of human resource that understands what it takes to make an economy tick and contribute to sustainable social and environmental development of the country,” he stated.
More than ever before, he noted that Ghana needed people with creative abilities to come up with innovative inventions that would boost agricultural practices to enhance food security, promote safe and efficient exploitation of the mineral wealth of the country and address environmental degradation, among others.
Speaking on the topic “Science and Technology Education in Nation Building”, the President of ANUC, Dr Samuel Donkor said in a world dominated by technology, access to knowledge was more important than access to natural resources and capital, saying advances in science and technology had affected every sphere of human life, from education, transport, communication, commerce, employment and many others.
According to him, unlike the past, countries like Japan and others with limited natural resources had evolved into dominant economies by focusing on science and technology which had been their engine of economic and social development.
“These countries including India can boast of a reasonably strong educational, research, pharmaceutical, industrial infrastructure, space technologies and automobiles”, Dr Donkor said.
He indicated that it was the immense advantage of technology to the country’s socio-economic development that the ANUC had deliberately chosen science and technology based education to prepare the youth to look into the future with confidence and contribute to nation-building.
“But we must not forget that the fast changing technologies of today often make skills redundant unless a continuous programme of skill upgrading is taken. Education can no longer be limited to the days of university but has to be a continuous exercise,” he reminded the graduands.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
LET'S ADDRESS CAUSES OF CLIMATE CHANGE (NOV 24, SPREAD)
President John Evans Atta Mills has called for effective collaboration among metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies, traditional authorities, religious bodies and other stakeholders to help address the causes of climate change, which is threatening human survival.
He said global warming was creating severe environmental consequences such as drought, floods, rise in sea levels, coastal erosion, deforestation, land degradation, loss of biodiversity and many other harmful effects.
The President made the call in an address read on his behalf by the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Mr Joseph Yieleh Chireh, at this year’s Akwantukese Festival of the chiefs and people of the New Juaben Traditional Area.
“Unfortunately, developing countries, including Ghana, are the primary and worst casualties of global warming and this calls on us to constitute community watch committees to fight this menace,” he said.
The occasion, which marked the 131st anniversary of the settlement of the people of New Juaben at their present location, attracted a large gathering of people from all walks of life, including the Eastern Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo; his deputy, Mr Baba Jamal, and the President of the City of Rochester and Livingstone, New York, Mrs Cynthia Oswald.
It was on the theme, “Effective partnership between the State and traditional authorities for sustainable development”.
The President said the burning issues concerning climate change had assumed global dimensions because of the immense danger they posed to human survival across the globe.
To reduce the effects of the phenomenon, he stressed the need for collaboration among stakeholders, not only at the international and local levels but also at the community level, as “we in the community are invariably the architects of these hazards”.
Emphasising the role traditional authorities could play, the President indicated that in the few past decades chiefs were responsible for the preservation of natural resources in their areas.
“They ensured that at least water bodies were kept safe and clean, curbed societal and individual habits that threatened the safety of our forests, sea fronts and the general surroundings. This was done through surveillance and pressure to comply with established customs and practices,” Prof. Mills said.
He, however, indicated that under current trends in rural development, “this aspect of traditional responsibility has, to a very large extent, diminished”.
On development, he said the government was determined to get the nation firmly anchored on the ladder of economic development to ensure that the desired economic transformation was realistically achieved.
“In this regard, I want to assure Ghanaians that my government is vigorously pursuing its agenda of building a better Ghana and we shall surely succeed,” he stressed.
Prof. Mills assured the people that since the country’s economic strength resided in agriculture, investment in the sector had been ranked high in the government’s development priorities.
The President commended the Omanhene of the New Juaben Traditional Area, Daasebre (Prof. Emeritus) Oti Boateng, and the New Juaben Traditional Council for their commitment to the development of the area.
In his welcoming address, Daasebre Oti Boateng said some of the achievements of his 17-year reign included extensive installation of street lighting system, electrification projects, the construction of affordable housing units, a new modern library for New Juaben and the ongoing Koforidua water project.
With respect to education, he expressed joy at the establishment of the All Nations University College (ANUC) in Koforidua and the initiative of the college to introduce a Faculty of Oil and Gas for the emerging oil industry.
The Omanhene appealed to the government to upgrade New Juaben from a municipality to metropolitan status, since its population remained higher than some of the metropolitan areas in the country.
He said global warming was creating severe environmental consequences such as drought, floods, rise in sea levels, coastal erosion, deforestation, land degradation, loss of biodiversity and many other harmful effects.
The President made the call in an address read on his behalf by the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Mr Joseph Yieleh Chireh, at this year’s Akwantukese Festival of the chiefs and people of the New Juaben Traditional Area.
“Unfortunately, developing countries, including Ghana, are the primary and worst casualties of global warming and this calls on us to constitute community watch committees to fight this menace,” he said.
The occasion, which marked the 131st anniversary of the settlement of the people of New Juaben at their present location, attracted a large gathering of people from all walks of life, including the Eastern Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo; his deputy, Mr Baba Jamal, and the President of the City of Rochester and Livingstone, New York, Mrs Cynthia Oswald.
It was on the theme, “Effective partnership between the State and traditional authorities for sustainable development”.
The President said the burning issues concerning climate change had assumed global dimensions because of the immense danger they posed to human survival across the globe.
To reduce the effects of the phenomenon, he stressed the need for collaboration among stakeholders, not only at the international and local levels but also at the community level, as “we in the community are invariably the architects of these hazards”.
Emphasising the role traditional authorities could play, the President indicated that in the few past decades chiefs were responsible for the preservation of natural resources in their areas.
“They ensured that at least water bodies were kept safe and clean, curbed societal and individual habits that threatened the safety of our forests, sea fronts and the general surroundings. This was done through surveillance and pressure to comply with established customs and practices,” Prof. Mills said.
He, however, indicated that under current trends in rural development, “this aspect of traditional responsibility has, to a very large extent, diminished”.
On development, he said the government was determined to get the nation firmly anchored on the ladder of economic development to ensure that the desired economic transformation was realistically achieved.
“In this regard, I want to assure Ghanaians that my government is vigorously pursuing its agenda of building a better Ghana and we shall surely succeed,” he stressed.
Prof. Mills assured the people that since the country’s economic strength resided in agriculture, investment in the sector had been ranked high in the government’s development priorities.
The President commended the Omanhene of the New Juaben Traditional Area, Daasebre (Prof. Emeritus) Oti Boateng, and the New Juaben Traditional Council for their commitment to the development of the area.
In his welcoming address, Daasebre Oti Boateng said some of the achievements of his 17-year reign included extensive installation of street lighting system, electrification projects, the construction of affordable housing units, a new modern library for New Juaben and the ongoing Koforidua water project.
With respect to education, he expressed joy at the establishment of the All Nations University College (ANUC) in Koforidua and the initiative of the college to introduce a Faculty of Oil and Gas for the emerging oil industry.
The Omanhene appealed to the government to upgrade New Juaben from a municipality to metropolitan status, since its population remained higher than some of the metropolitan areas in the country.
Sunday, November 22, 2009
MAN FOUND HANGING IN COMPOUND HOUSE (BACK PAGE, NOV 21)
THE body of a man, believed to be in his 70s, has been found hanging from the pillar of a wall in a compound house at Timber Market, a suburb of Koforidua, in a case suspected to be suicide.
This comes less than a week after another case in which a popular businesswoman in Koforidua was allegedly murdered by a spiritualist in the town.
In the latest incident which occurred about 5.30 am yesterday, the body of Mumuni Zakaria, who lived in the house at Timber Market, was found by family members and neighbours with a rope around his neck in an open place where, according to his neighbours, the deceased used to pray.
A large crowd gathered at the scene to catch a glimpse of the deceased, whom many described as “a decent and quiet fellow”.
Grief-stricken relatives who spoke to the Daily Graphic indicated that the deceased, who had two elderly children, looked healthy and sound prior to his death.
According to them, he had spent time with them the whole of Thursday.
“We fed him just last night, after which we parted, until 5.30 a.m. when we found him hanging dead by a wall where he used to pray,” a 21-year-old niece of the deceased said.
This comes less than a week after another case in which a popular businesswoman in Koforidua was allegedly murdered by a spiritualist in the town.
In the latest incident which occurred about 5.30 am yesterday, the body of Mumuni Zakaria, who lived in the house at Timber Market, was found by family members and neighbours with a rope around his neck in an open place where, according to his neighbours, the deceased used to pray.
A large crowd gathered at the scene to catch a glimpse of the deceased, whom many described as “a decent and quiet fellow”.
Grief-stricken relatives who spoke to the Daily Graphic indicated that the deceased, who had two elderly children, looked healthy and sound prior to his death.
According to them, he had spent time with them the whole of Thursday.
“We fed him just last night, after which we parted, until 5.30 a.m. when we found him hanging dead by a wall where he used to pray,” a 21-year-old niece of the deceased said.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
I SUSPECT MY LANDLORD KILLED BUSINESSWOMAN...Spiritualist tells police (PAGE 3)
THE spiritualist who is alleged to have murdered a 30-year-old businesswoman at Okorase, near Koforidua, has provided a statement to the police, alleging that the lady might have been killed by his landlord.
Joseph Tetteh told the police that during the deceased’s previous visits to his shrine, she had often complained to him about the landlord’s harassment and proposals to marry her.
According to the spiritualist, he, on that fateful day, had an appointment with the deceased at his shrine at Domeabra Junction but he was at Okorase when he received a call from the deceased about 9.30 a.m. that she was being harassed by his landlord, upon which he returned home, where he heard an unusual noise.
He said when he entered the house he saw Rita alive but lying in a pool of blood at the shrine and he quickly held her and asked her to tell him what had happened.
“With her mouth open, she attempted to speak but she could not,” Tetteh was said to have told the police.
He said in his confused state, he rushed out to drink heavily and went back to the house to sleep until about 12 a.m. when he woke up and found the body of Rita still lying in the pool of blood.
He then wrapped the body in his bedspread and made an attempt to dump it close to the house of her fiancé, near Mile 50 in Koforidua, adding, “I did this because Rita was good to me.”
Prior to her death, Rita’s boyfriend had picked her up early Saturday morning in his car and taken her to Srodae, a Koforidua suburb, where she was said to have told the boyfriend that she was going to see somebody at the Koforidua Central Market.
The police said Tetteh claimed that he had an appointment with the deceased because she had offered to come to his shrine at Domeabra Junction to thank him with an amount of GH¢250 and to seek further assistance to enable her to win the heart of her boyfriend, one Samuel Kwesi Afranie, a carpenter, who, she said, suspected her of cheating on him.
He claimed that the GH¢250 was GH¢50 more than the GH200 he had demanded for assisting her spiritually to expand her business.
According to the police source, the fetish priest said during interrogation that Rita, also known as Afia Atta in and around Effiduase, a Koforidua suburb, had been a regular customer who often visited his shrine to seek spiritual assistance.
Joseph Tetteh told the police that during the deceased’s previous visits to his shrine, she had often complained to him about the landlord’s harassment and proposals to marry her.
According to the spiritualist, he, on that fateful day, had an appointment with the deceased at his shrine at Domeabra Junction but he was at Okorase when he received a call from the deceased about 9.30 a.m. that she was being harassed by his landlord, upon which he returned home, where he heard an unusual noise.
He said when he entered the house he saw Rita alive but lying in a pool of blood at the shrine and he quickly held her and asked her to tell him what had happened.
“With her mouth open, she attempted to speak but she could not,” Tetteh was said to have told the police.
He said in his confused state, he rushed out to drink heavily and went back to the house to sleep until about 12 a.m. when he woke up and found the body of Rita still lying in the pool of blood.
He then wrapped the body in his bedspread and made an attempt to dump it close to the house of her fiancé, near Mile 50 in Koforidua, adding, “I did this because Rita was good to me.”
Prior to her death, Rita’s boyfriend had picked her up early Saturday morning in his car and taken her to Srodae, a Koforidua suburb, where she was said to have told the boyfriend that she was going to see somebody at the Koforidua Central Market.
The police said Tetteh claimed that he had an appointment with the deceased because she had offered to come to his shrine at Domeabra Junction to thank him with an amount of GH¢250 and to seek further assistance to enable her to win the heart of her boyfriend, one Samuel Kwesi Afranie, a carpenter, who, she said, suspected her of cheating on him.
He claimed that the GH¢250 was GH¢50 more than the GH200 he had demanded for assisting her spiritually to expand her business.
According to the police source, the fetish priest said during interrogation that Rita, also known as Afia Atta in and around Effiduase, a Koforidua suburb, had been a regular customer who often visited his shrine to seek spiritual assistance.
I SUSPECT MY LANDLORD KILLED BUSINESSWOMAN...Spiritualist tells police (PAGE 3)
THE spiritualist who is alleged to have murdered a 30-year-old businesswoman at Okorase, near Koforidua, has provided a statement to the police, alleging that the lady might have been killed by his landlord.
Joseph Tetteh told the police that during the deceased’s previous visits to his shrine, she had often complained to him about the landlord’s harassment and proposals to marry her.
According to the spiritualist, he, on that fateful day, had an appointment with the deceased at his shrine at Domeabra Junction but he was at Okorase when he received a call from the deceased about 9.30 a.m. that she was being harassed by his landlord, upon which he returned home, where he heard an unusual noise.
He said when he entered the house he saw Rita alive but lying in a pool of blood at the shrine and he quickly held her and asked her to tell him what had happened.
“With her mouth open, she attempted to speak but she could not,” Tetteh was said to have told the police.
He said in his confused state, he rushed out to drink heavily and went back to the house to sleep until about 12 a.m. when he woke up and found the body of Rita still lying in the pool of blood.
He then wrapped the body in his bedspread and made an attempt to dump it close to the house of her fiancé, near Mile 50 in Koforidua, adding, “I did this because Rita was good to me.”
Prior to her death, Rita’s boyfriend had picked her up early Saturday morning in his car and taken her to Srodae, a Koforidua suburb, where she was said to have told the boyfriend that she was going to see somebody at the Koforidua Central Market.
The police said Tetteh claimed that he had an appointment with the deceased because she had offered to come to his shrine at Domeabra Junction to thank him with an amount of GH¢250 and to seek further assistance to enable her to win the heart of her boyfriend, one Samuel Kwesi Afranie, a carpenter, who, she said, suspected her of cheating on him.
He claimed that the GH¢250 was GH¢50 more than the GH200 he had demanded for assisting her spiritually to expand her business.
According to the police source, the fetish priest said during interrogation that Rita, also known as Afia Atta in and around Effiduase, a Koforidua suburb, had been a regular customer who often visited his shrine to seek spiritual assistance.
Joseph Tetteh told the police that during the deceased’s previous visits to his shrine, she had often complained to him about the landlord’s harassment and proposals to marry her.
According to the spiritualist, he, on that fateful day, had an appointment with the deceased at his shrine at Domeabra Junction but he was at Okorase when he received a call from the deceased about 9.30 a.m. that she was being harassed by his landlord, upon which he returned home, where he heard an unusual noise.
He said when he entered the house he saw Rita alive but lying in a pool of blood at the shrine and he quickly held her and asked her to tell him what had happened.
“With her mouth open, she attempted to speak but she could not,” Tetteh was said to have told the police.
He said in his confused state, he rushed out to drink heavily and went back to the house to sleep until about 12 a.m. when he woke up and found the body of Rita still lying in the pool of blood.
He then wrapped the body in his bedspread and made an attempt to dump it close to the house of her fiancé, near Mile 50 in Koforidua, adding, “I did this because Rita was good to me.”
Prior to her death, Rita’s boyfriend had picked her up early Saturday morning in his car and taken her to Srodae, a Koforidua suburb, where she was said to have told the boyfriend that she was going to see somebody at the Koforidua Central Market.
The police said Tetteh claimed that he had an appointment with the deceased because she had offered to come to his shrine at Domeabra Junction to thank him with an amount of GH¢250 and to seek further assistance to enable her to win the heart of her boyfriend, one Samuel Kwesi Afranie, a carpenter, who, she said, suspected her of cheating on him.
He claimed that the GH¢250 was GH¢50 more than the GH200 he had demanded for assisting her spiritually to expand her business.
According to the police source, the fetish priest said during interrogation that Rita, also known as Afia Atta in and around Effiduase, a Koforidua suburb, had been a regular customer who often visited his shrine to seek spiritual assistance.
Monday, November 16, 2009
BLOODY WEEKEND...Boy, 6, beheaded at Abesim, Woman, 30, killed at Okorase, 4 Robbers gunned down in Ksi (LEAD STORY, NOV 16)
Story; Akwasi Ampratwum Mensah & Samuel Duodu at Abesim, Nana Konadu Agyeman at Okorase & Kwame Asare Boadu in Kumasi
THE grisly murder of a famous business woman, 30, near Koforidua, the gruesome beheading of a six-year-old boy near Sunyani and the gunning down of four armed robbers in Kumasi in a shootout with the police marked a weekend of blood and horror for some residents of those parts of the country.
At Abesim, near Sunyani in the Brong Ahafo Region, hundreds of residents besieged the crime scene, eager to catch a glimpse of Ernest Kwame Awuah, alias President, who was on display with the mutilated body of his six-year-old nephew, Charles Sey.
Awuah allegedly pierced Charles’s right eye and ear and then slashed his throat.
The victim was the son of the suspect’s younger brother.
Briefing the Daily Graphic after the bizarre incident which happened about 11 a.m. on Saturday, the Sunyani Municipal Police Commander, Superintendent Charles Botwe, said following a report from a resident, he dispatched a team of policemen to the deceased’s grandmother’s house where the little boy lived and the team found the suspect carrying the body of the boy on his lap in a room where he had allegedly committed the crime.
Charles’s body has been deposited at the Regional Hospital in Sunyani for autopsy.
According to Mr Botwe, the police had found it difficult to take a statement from the suspect, since he was behaving abnormally, but noted that a caution statement had been taken from the suspect’s father, while the police were yet to take another one from Charles’s grandmother, after which Awuah would be put before court.
An uncle of the boy’s, Mr Kwasi Ollu, a farmer, told the Daily Graphic that Charles’s mother, who is staying in Techiman, was yet to be informed about her son’s death, saying that she separated with the boy’s father about five years ago when they were staying together at Tanoano, a farming community near Abesim.
At Okorase in the New Juaben municipality of the Eastern Region, news of the Sunday morning murder of Rita Baah, affectionately called Afia Atta, allegedly by a fetish priest, spread like bush fire throughout the town.
The deceased, a resident of Effiduase in Koforidua who operates a cosmetics shop and a boutique at the Daasebre Roundabout in Koforidua, was said to have been hit several times on the forehead with a hammer by the fetish priest at his shrine at Okorase about 12.30 a.m.
After the crime, Joseph Tetteh, the 35-year-old traditional priest, popularly known as Mallam, was reported to have tied the victim’s hands and legs, covered it with a cloth and placed it on his motorbike in an attempt to dump it at a spot far away from Okorase and create the impression that she had been knocked down by a vehicle.
However, luck eluded him when he was spotted by some passengers travelling along the Okorase-Mamfe road about 1.30 a.m. with the body of the deceased strewn across the motorbike.
He was reported to have swerved to the left of the road where he abandoned both the body and the motorbike and fled into a nearby bush at Tei Nkwanta near Okorase.
That was after the passengers in the vehicle travelling from Aburi to Koforidua attempted to question him over where he was taking the body to.
Briefing the Daily Graphic in Koforidua, the New Juaben Municipal Police Commander, Superintendent John A. Naami, said about 12.30 a.m. the police received a distress call from some travellers at Tei Nkwanta that they had spotted a man conveying a dead body on a motorbike.
He said the passengers told the police that the fetish priest had been seen driving from Okorase to dump the body by the roadside to create the impression that the deceased had been knocked and killed by a vehicle.
When the passengers attempted to question him as to where he was taking the body, the fetish priest was said to have fled into the bush.
Supt Naami said a team of police investigators was immediately dispatched to the scene where they found Rita’s tied body covered in a cloth and strewn across the motorbike, with registration number GN 8843 Z.
He said the police traced the motorbike to the fetish priest’s house but they never found him. However, some of the youth of Okorase and Tei Nkwanta, two neighbouring communities, mounted an intensive search and arrested Tetteh in a bush at Tei Nkwanta where he was hiding about 1 a.m. on Sunday.
The timely intervention of the police saved him from being lynched.
During interrogation, Tetteh was reported to have told the police that some unknown people had killed Rita but that he had only attempted taking it to dump it somewhere.
The New Juaben Municipal Police Commander, who indicated that the police were carrying out further investigation into the murder, commended the residents of Okorase and Tei Nkwanta for helping to arrest the fetish priest.
Meanwhile, when the Daily Graphic visited the New Juaben Central Police Station, a large gathering of residents, including the family of the business woman and her boyfriend, was seen in utter shock and tears over Rita’s death.
In the Ashanti Region, the regional Police Command took the fight against armed robbery to another level at the weekend when they shot dead four suspected armed robbers, all believed to be in their late 30s, during a gun battle at Konkromase, a suburb of Kumasi.
Friday night’s operation was the second biggest police offensive against armed robbery in Ashanti this year and the dead suspects brought to 26 the number of armed robbers killed by the police in the region this year.
One of the four robbers was identified as Abdul Razak Ibrahim, alias Fante-Fante.
Razak, described as a hardened criminal, had earlier been arrested in a robbery case but he was granted bail by a Kumasi High Court in November 2006 but had since failed to appear before court.
Two others were identified only as Fiifi and Rashid, both ex-convicts, with the fourth one yet to be identified.
They were among a group of seven armed robbers who had gone on a robbery spree on the rainy night. They were actually in the process of attacking their fourth victim when men from the Police Buffalo Unit encountered them.
According to the police, those who managed to escape bolted with cash of GH¢95,000 believed to have been taken from victims of the robbery operations.
A number of offensive weapons, including four pump action guns, three locally manufactured pistols, 21 live ammunition, eight spent cartridges, one heavy-duty cutter and two mobile phones, were retrieved by the police from the scene of the shooting.
A KIA taxi, which the robbers had snatched from its driver, and a Nissan Pathfinder, which they took from its female owner after shooting her in the right shoulder, were later found abandoned at various locations in the city.
The woman was treated and discharged at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital.
Briefing journalists, the Ashanti Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Patrick Timbillah, said it all started about 6 p.m. when the robbers snatched the KIA taxi from its driver at gunpoint at Buokrom, a Kumasi suburb.
They then used the taxi in the second operation in which they attacked a woman about 7 p.m. at Atonsu, also in Kumasi, and snatched her Nissan Pathfinder from her.
DCOP Timbillah said the robbers shot the woman, who was returning from work, before taking her vehicle away.
They abandoned the taxi and used the Nissan Pathfinder to attack a man who had just arrived in Kumasi from Accra at Asokwa and took away his bag containing GH¢95,000.
DCOP Timbillah it was when the robbers went on the fourth operation at Konkromase that the police pounced on them. About 8.30 p.m., they attacked a house at Konkromase and when the police reached there, the robbers opened fire on them.
He said the police returned fire, killing the four, while the three others escaped.
The Nissan Pathfinder was later found abandoned at Buokrom, together with the bag which contained the GH¢95,000.
THE grisly murder of a famous business woman, 30, near Koforidua, the gruesome beheading of a six-year-old boy near Sunyani and the gunning down of four armed robbers in Kumasi in a shootout with the police marked a weekend of blood and horror for some residents of those parts of the country.
At Abesim, near Sunyani in the Brong Ahafo Region, hundreds of residents besieged the crime scene, eager to catch a glimpse of Ernest Kwame Awuah, alias President, who was on display with the mutilated body of his six-year-old nephew, Charles Sey.
Awuah allegedly pierced Charles’s right eye and ear and then slashed his throat.
The victim was the son of the suspect’s younger brother.
Briefing the Daily Graphic after the bizarre incident which happened about 11 a.m. on Saturday, the Sunyani Municipal Police Commander, Superintendent Charles Botwe, said following a report from a resident, he dispatched a team of policemen to the deceased’s grandmother’s house where the little boy lived and the team found the suspect carrying the body of the boy on his lap in a room where he had allegedly committed the crime.
Charles’s body has been deposited at the Regional Hospital in Sunyani for autopsy.
According to Mr Botwe, the police had found it difficult to take a statement from the suspect, since he was behaving abnormally, but noted that a caution statement had been taken from the suspect’s father, while the police were yet to take another one from Charles’s grandmother, after which Awuah would be put before court.
An uncle of the boy’s, Mr Kwasi Ollu, a farmer, told the Daily Graphic that Charles’s mother, who is staying in Techiman, was yet to be informed about her son’s death, saying that she separated with the boy’s father about five years ago when they were staying together at Tanoano, a farming community near Abesim.
At Okorase in the New Juaben municipality of the Eastern Region, news of the Sunday morning murder of Rita Baah, affectionately called Afia Atta, allegedly by a fetish priest, spread like bush fire throughout the town.
The deceased, a resident of Effiduase in Koforidua who operates a cosmetics shop and a boutique at the Daasebre Roundabout in Koforidua, was said to have been hit several times on the forehead with a hammer by the fetish priest at his shrine at Okorase about 12.30 a.m.
After the crime, Joseph Tetteh, the 35-year-old traditional priest, popularly known as Mallam, was reported to have tied the victim’s hands and legs, covered it with a cloth and placed it on his motorbike in an attempt to dump it at a spot far away from Okorase and create the impression that she had been knocked down by a vehicle.
However, luck eluded him when he was spotted by some passengers travelling along the Okorase-Mamfe road about 1.30 a.m. with the body of the deceased strewn across the motorbike.
He was reported to have swerved to the left of the road where he abandoned both the body and the motorbike and fled into a nearby bush at Tei Nkwanta near Okorase.
That was after the passengers in the vehicle travelling from Aburi to Koforidua attempted to question him over where he was taking the body to.
Briefing the Daily Graphic in Koforidua, the New Juaben Municipal Police Commander, Superintendent John A. Naami, said about 12.30 a.m. the police received a distress call from some travellers at Tei Nkwanta that they had spotted a man conveying a dead body on a motorbike.
He said the passengers told the police that the fetish priest had been seen driving from Okorase to dump the body by the roadside to create the impression that the deceased had been knocked and killed by a vehicle.
When the passengers attempted to question him as to where he was taking the body, the fetish priest was said to have fled into the bush.
Supt Naami said a team of police investigators was immediately dispatched to the scene where they found Rita’s tied body covered in a cloth and strewn across the motorbike, with registration number GN 8843 Z.
He said the police traced the motorbike to the fetish priest’s house but they never found him. However, some of the youth of Okorase and Tei Nkwanta, two neighbouring communities, mounted an intensive search and arrested Tetteh in a bush at Tei Nkwanta where he was hiding about 1 a.m. on Sunday.
The timely intervention of the police saved him from being lynched.
During interrogation, Tetteh was reported to have told the police that some unknown people had killed Rita but that he had only attempted taking it to dump it somewhere.
The New Juaben Municipal Police Commander, who indicated that the police were carrying out further investigation into the murder, commended the residents of Okorase and Tei Nkwanta for helping to arrest the fetish priest.
Meanwhile, when the Daily Graphic visited the New Juaben Central Police Station, a large gathering of residents, including the family of the business woman and her boyfriend, was seen in utter shock and tears over Rita’s death.
In the Ashanti Region, the regional Police Command took the fight against armed robbery to another level at the weekend when they shot dead four suspected armed robbers, all believed to be in their late 30s, during a gun battle at Konkromase, a suburb of Kumasi.
Friday night’s operation was the second biggest police offensive against armed robbery in Ashanti this year and the dead suspects brought to 26 the number of armed robbers killed by the police in the region this year.
One of the four robbers was identified as Abdul Razak Ibrahim, alias Fante-Fante.
Razak, described as a hardened criminal, had earlier been arrested in a robbery case but he was granted bail by a Kumasi High Court in November 2006 but had since failed to appear before court.
Two others were identified only as Fiifi and Rashid, both ex-convicts, with the fourth one yet to be identified.
They were among a group of seven armed robbers who had gone on a robbery spree on the rainy night. They were actually in the process of attacking their fourth victim when men from the Police Buffalo Unit encountered them.
According to the police, those who managed to escape bolted with cash of GH¢95,000 believed to have been taken from victims of the robbery operations.
A number of offensive weapons, including four pump action guns, three locally manufactured pistols, 21 live ammunition, eight spent cartridges, one heavy-duty cutter and two mobile phones, were retrieved by the police from the scene of the shooting.
A KIA taxi, which the robbers had snatched from its driver, and a Nissan Pathfinder, which they took from its female owner after shooting her in the right shoulder, were later found abandoned at various locations in the city.
The woman was treated and discharged at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital.
Briefing journalists, the Ashanti Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Patrick Timbillah, said it all started about 6 p.m. when the robbers snatched the KIA taxi from its driver at gunpoint at Buokrom, a Kumasi suburb.
They then used the taxi in the second operation in which they attacked a woman about 7 p.m. at Atonsu, also in Kumasi, and snatched her Nissan Pathfinder from her.
DCOP Timbillah said the robbers shot the woman, who was returning from work, before taking her vehicle away.
They abandoned the taxi and used the Nissan Pathfinder to attack a man who had just arrived in Kumasi from Accra at Asokwa and took away his bag containing GH¢95,000.
DCOP Timbillah it was when the robbers went on the fourth operation at Konkromase that the police pounced on them. About 8.30 p.m., they attacked a house at Konkromase and when the police reached there, the robbers opened fire on them.
He said the police returned fire, killing the four, while the three others escaped.
The Nissan Pathfinder was later found abandoned at Buokrom, together with the bag which contained the GH¢95,000.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
OIL PALM ...The multi-purspose tree (pages 24 & 25) NOV 7
SOME call it the wonder tree, but others think it is a utility crop because of the many uses it is put to. In the rural settings, the palm tree is regarded as a reliable crop and those who cultivate it never regret.
They can get palm fruit, palm oil and palm kernel oil. The branches can be used to weave baskets and provide shelter, while the leaves can be used to make brooms. In some cases, palm oil is applied to wounds to aid the healing process, as it is believed that unrefined palm oil has additional anti-microbial effect, although research has not clearly confirmed this.
When the crop reaches what may be termed its “menopause”, it is felled for palm wine, which may be drunk or distilled into the local gin popularly called ‘Akpeteshie’. One can get mushrooms from the decaying stem, which can also serve as manure and many other uses.
While the palm tree produces all the products listed above, through technology many value additions have been obtained from the cultivation of oil palm, such as soap, detergents, biscuits, ice cream, margarine, biodiesel, as a supplement in animal feed, candles, cosmetics, glue, lubricating grease, among others.
Given the immense usefulness of the crop and the numerous employment opportunities it can offer to the people, the government must give a serious consideration to launching an agricultural diversification programme to reduce the country’s over reliance on cocoa and fast dwindling natural resources and address the land tenure problems to facilitate large-scale cultivation of oil palm in the country.
The country’s reliance on cocoa over the past decades should seize because it has been realised that oil palm offers a better solution to the its foreign exchange constraints, since there is abundant demand and market for vegetable oils.
According to one palm oil expert, if Ghana should plant between 10,000 and 20,000 hectares of palm oil for the next 10 years, the country would not import oil but would rather increase its foreign exchange earnings.
In his opinion, if the Government desired to ensure access to cheap food and potable water, which should not be a challenge for the daily survival of the people, then the concept of integrated agriculture should not focus only on cocoa but also all food crops, including economic crops such as the oil palm, on which Malaysia concentrated after it had put to the background its reliance on cocoa.
Indeed, if Ghana had, over the years, pathetically failed to recognise the huge economic potential of this wonderful crop, the abundant successes obtained from the large-scale cultivation of the crop by Malaysia and Indonesia since the 1870s should be a motivating factor for the government to also show commitment to the cultivation of oil palm in the country.
The palm oil industry has been a historically significant part of Malaysia’s economy. The tree, originally from West Africa, mainly Ghana, was first introduced to Malaysia in the early 1870s as an ornamental plant. However, commercial planting of the tree took place in 1871, though the industry remained largely dormant until the 1960s when the Malaysian government launched an agricultural diversification programme to reduce the country’s economic dependence on rubber and tin.
In the late 1960s, the government introduced several land settlement schemes for planting oil palm as a means to raise landless farmers and smallholders out of poverty. Ever since, Malaysia has used the returns from oil palm to leap its economy from that of a developing one into an Asian Tiger.
Recognising the huge economic potential of the crop, the Malaysian government started refining the crude palm oil in the 1970s, marking the introduction of a wide range of processed palm oil products.
Today, the Malaysian palm oil industry has grown to produce 51 per cent of the world’s palm oil and 62 per cent of the world’s oil palm exports, making palm oil the country’s main agricultural produce that it exports.
Besides, it is said that in 2008 the country exported over 15 million tonnes of palm oil, majority of which went to China, the EU, Pakistan, the US, India and Japan, giving Malaysia $17.7 billion in export earnings in just one year.
At the height of the economic crisis which has crippled many economies across the world in the past two years, palm oil exports have played a significant role in saving the Malaysian economy from bankruptcy.
With Malaysia’s economy now slowly recovering from the recession, the palm oil industry is poised to play a leading role in its economic boom.
Looking at the immense economic gains Malaysia has derived from the cultivation of oil palm, there is so much that Ghana can also do to gain the same way. After all, the very oil palm that Malaysia has strategically used since 1870 to build its developing economy into an Asian Tiger was believed to have been obtained from Ghana, where successive governments terribly failed to recognise the economic potential of the crop.
Malaysia’s strategic use of the crop should encourage Ghana to either copy or show similar commitment to initiate steps aimed at ensuring the large-scale cultivation of this “crop of gold”.
It would be recalled that in the late 1960s Ghana’s first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, established many state farms, majority of which focused on the development of oil palm plantations, many of which later collapsed. In spite of that, if the net effect of oil palm cultivation is anything to go by, the country should reflect on Acheampong’s far-sighted “Operation Feed Yourself” programme, during which he also established many oil palm plantations in the country.
A typical example of Acheampong’s legacy is the Kwae Oil Palm Plantation located in three districts in the Eastern Region, namely, Kwaebibirem, Akyemmansa and Birim North. This plantation has gone through many transitions, from being state-owned to state-private partnership till today when it is wholly owned by a Belgian company, SIAT Ghana Limited, with many other plantations in Cote d’Ivoire and Nigeria.
Distinctly, this plantation today remains the biggest and most successful oil palm plantation in Ghana, a situation that has arisen as a result of prudent managerial skills and the hard work of the management, staff and outgrowers of the company over the years.
What strikes many visitors to the Kwae plantation in recent times is the vigorous regeneration of the plantation through a replanting exercise. An oil palm plantation is said to have a 20-year cycle, at the end of which period if anybody wants the plantation to continue to be viable, it has to be replanted.
At Kwae, the green landscape offered by the replanting is something that those who cherish an environmentally friendly atmosphere must desire to see. This deliberate replanting exercise explains why most of the state oil palm plantations collapsed after the felling of the trees because the state did not have the wherewithal to undertake such capital and labour intensive exercise. The same elaborate exercise characterised the Kwamoso plantation in the Eastern Region.
The Ghana Oil Palm Development Company (GOPDC) is an integrated agro-industrial company specialising in the organic cultivation of oil palm, the extraction of crude oil and palm kernel oil and refining and fractionation of these produce.
It was initiated by the government in 1975 and privatised in 1995 to a Belgian company, SIAT Ghana Limited, which owned 80 per cent, with the government taking the remaining 20 per cent. However, the GOPDC is now wholly owned by SIAT and two other stakeholders.
The company, which has been able to sustain its lead in the field of oil palm cultivation in the country, currently has more than 21,000 hectares of oil palm plantation at Kwae, with more than 13,000 hectares being developed by over 5,000 outgrowers the company has contracted.
The company, with processing facilities, including a palm oil mill with a capacity of 60 metric tonnes (mt) per hour, a palm kernel crushing plant of 60mt per day, a refinery and fractionation plant with a capacity of 100mt per day and a total storage capacity of more than 13,000mt for finished products, is spread over a vast stretch of land with a radius of 30km.
It also has other facilities, including a tank farm in Tema with a capacity of 8,200mt, with an additional 12,000mt expansion capacity which is almost near completion.
The company’s plantations at the Kwae and the Okumaning estates are all certified organic, as no chemicals, pesticides or herbicides are used, resulting in a healthy superior quality product, making the company’s products attract a bonus on the world market.
The products include crude palm oil, palm kernel oil, palm kernel cake, refined bleached deodorised oil, refined palm kernel oil, free fatty acid, olein and supper olein and stearin.
The company, which planted its first sets of palm trees in 1976 and initiated the cultivation of an organic palm oil plantation in 1999, is already listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) and has created secure income for over 50,000 people.
In 2002, the plantation positioned itself to produce certified organic palm oil and palm kernel oil and since 1977 it has implemented a vast outgrower scheme.
As part of its focus on maintaining its market lead in the oil palm industry, the GOPDC also provides high-yielding seedlings, fertilisers and extension services for farmers on a loan basis and has created 31 collection centres in its catchment area to facilitate the collection of fruits from outgrowers.
Sharing the company’s strategic development with the Daily Graphic, the Managing Director, GOPDC, Mr John C. Inkumsah, said his outfit was fully committed to future sustainable growth of the oil palm business and, therefore, it would ensure that very high quality seeds were nursed and planted.
“The GOPDC is committed to quality products and has equipped its mill and refinery with state-of-the-art laboratory equipment to analyse each processing stage before the products reach consumers, both for domestic and industrial use,” he explained.
The adhere to strict environmental practices to ensure the conservation of the environment, Mr Inkumsah, said his outfit had installed an environmentally friendly 30-metric tonne boiler which produced 2.5 megawatts of electricity, adding that waste generated from the company’s plant was used as fuel for the boiler to reduce pollution.
He indicated that the company obtained 60 per cent of its energy requirement from the boiler, while 30 per cent was being supplied by the Electricity Company of Ghana, with the remaining 10 per cent produced by the genset.
“As part of our conservation action plan with the Ghana Wildlife Society, the management of GOPDC does not only ensure ecological monitoring of its plantation and but also undertakes regular reforestation activities and the planting of cover crops and indigenous trees along rivers within the company catchment areas,” he said, adding that it had also created awareness among its employees, schools and communities within its catchment area and constructed a third treatment pond to avoid any waste spillage.
Mr Inkumsah, who expressed delight at the achievements of the company over the decades, said as part of its corporate social responsibility, the GOPDC had constructed various water projects at Kusi, Anweam, Kwae and Jamestown, while, to improve educational standards in its catchment areas, it had constructed a classroom block at Anweam and a community library at Akwatia.
“We have also provided electricity and street lamps at Okumaning and undertaken the rehabilitation of various stretches of roads in our catchment areas, while we have facilitated the construction of an MTN antenna which has improved mobile phone business at Kwae and its environs,” he stressed.
On challenges, the MD said the company had been paying high sums of GH¢140 to farmers for their produce, an incentive that had attracted other oil palm growers from the Western Region to sell their produce to the company.
“In spite of these motivating prices, some of the outgrowers have always been diverting their produce for domestic consumption and selling it to poachers in neighbouring countries such as Togo who are ready to offer any amount,” he lamented.
He also mentioned the uprooting of seedlings by members of communities within the company’s catchment area.
In the opinion of the GOPDC MD,, Ghana stood to gain enormously if the Government could lend support to the Ghanaian and foreign investors interested in large-scale oil palm plantation, as well as provide subsidies for smallholders in the form of fertilisers and other farm inputs to enable them to expand their farms to lift poor farmers and their dependants from poverty.
“Ghana will not only reap huge foreign exchange from the export of palm oil but also be in a better position to tackle head-on the unemployment problem facing the people,” he stated.
Considering the huge economic potential of oil palm and the enormous employment avenues it can create for the teeming unemployed youth, it is time the Government introduced viable land settlement schemes and provided the necessary support in the form of subsidies as a means to raise landless farmers and smallholders out of poverty, given the fact there are vast tracts of land that are suitable for oil palm plantation in the country.
Furthermore, if the Government is, indeed, determined to increase the country’s foreign exchange and not solely depend on exports of cocoa and other natural resources, the resort to the large-scale cultivation of oil palm, as amply demonstrated in the country by the GOPDC and internationally by Malaysia and Indonesia, which have leaped their developing economies into Asian Tigers, then the diversification of agriculture must be given the needed attention at all cost.
They can get palm fruit, palm oil and palm kernel oil. The branches can be used to weave baskets and provide shelter, while the leaves can be used to make brooms. In some cases, palm oil is applied to wounds to aid the healing process, as it is believed that unrefined palm oil has additional anti-microbial effect, although research has not clearly confirmed this.
When the crop reaches what may be termed its “menopause”, it is felled for palm wine, which may be drunk or distilled into the local gin popularly called ‘Akpeteshie’. One can get mushrooms from the decaying stem, which can also serve as manure and many other uses.
While the palm tree produces all the products listed above, through technology many value additions have been obtained from the cultivation of oil palm, such as soap, detergents, biscuits, ice cream, margarine, biodiesel, as a supplement in animal feed, candles, cosmetics, glue, lubricating grease, among others.
Given the immense usefulness of the crop and the numerous employment opportunities it can offer to the people, the government must give a serious consideration to launching an agricultural diversification programme to reduce the country’s over reliance on cocoa and fast dwindling natural resources and address the land tenure problems to facilitate large-scale cultivation of oil palm in the country.
The country’s reliance on cocoa over the past decades should seize because it has been realised that oil palm offers a better solution to the its foreign exchange constraints, since there is abundant demand and market for vegetable oils.
According to one palm oil expert, if Ghana should plant between 10,000 and 20,000 hectares of palm oil for the next 10 years, the country would not import oil but would rather increase its foreign exchange earnings.
In his opinion, if the Government desired to ensure access to cheap food and potable water, which should not be a challenge for the daily survival of the people, then the concept of integrated agriculture should not focus only on cocoa but also all food crops, including economic crops such as the oil palm, on which Malaysia concentrated after it had put to the background its reliance on cocoa.
Indeed, if Ghana had, over the years, pathetically failed to recognise the huge economic potential of this wonderful crop, the abundant successes obtained from the large-scale cultivation of the crop by Malaysia and Indonesia since the 1870s should be a motivating factor for the government to also show commitment to the cultivation of oil palm in the country.
The palm oil industry has been a historically significant part of Malaysia’s economy. The tree, originally from West Africa, mainly Ghana, was first introduced to Malaysia in the early 1870s as an ornamental plant. However, commercial planting of the tree took place in 1871, though the industry remained largely dormant until the 1960s when the Malaysian government launched an agricultural diversification programme to reduce the country’s economic dependence on rubber and tin.
In the late 1960s, the government introduced several land settlement schemes for planting oil palm as a means to raise landless farmers and smallholders out of poverty. Ever since, Malaysia has used the returns from oil palm to leap its economy from that of a developing one into an Asian Tiger.
Recognising the huge economic potential of the crop, the Malaysian government started refining the crude palm oil in the 1970s, marking the introduction of a wide range of processed palm oil products.
Today, the Malaysian palm oil industry has grown to produce 51 per cent of the world’s palm oil and 62 per cent of the world’s oil palm exports, making palm oil the country’s main agricultural produce that it exports.
Besides, it is said that in 2008 the country exported over 15 million tonnes of palm oil, majority of which went to China, the EU, Pakistan, the US, India and Japan, giving Malaysia $17.7 billion in export earnings in just one year.
At the height of the economic crisis which has crippled many economies across the world in the past two years, palm oil exports have played a significant role in saving the Malaysian economy from bankruptcy.
With Malaysia’s economy now slowly recovering from the recession, the palm oil industry is poised to play a leading role in its economic boom.
Looking at the immense economic gains Malaysia has derived from the cultivation of oil palm, there is so much that Ghana can also do to gain the same way. After all, the very oil palm that Malaysia has strategically used since 1870 to build its developing economy into an Asian Tiger was believed to have been obtained from Ghana, where successive governments terribly failed to recognise the economic potential of the crop.
Malaysia’s strategic use of the crop should encourage Ghana to either copy or show similar commitment to initiate steps aimed at ensuring the large-scale cultivation of this “crop of gold”.
It would be recalled that in the late 1960s Ghana’s first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, established many state farms, majority of which focused on the development of oil palm plantations, many of which later collapsed. In spite of that, if the net effect of oil palm cultivation is anything to go by, the country should reflect on Acheampong’s far-sighted “Operation Feed Yourself” programme, during which he also established many oil palm plantations in the country.
A typical example of Acheampong’s legacy is the Kwae Oil Palm Plantation located in three districts in the Eastern Region, namely, Kwaebibirem, Akyemmansa and Birim North. This plantation has gone through many transitions, from being state-owned to state-private partnership till today when it is wholly owned by a Belgian company, SIAT Ghana Limited, with many other plantations in Cote d’Ivoire and Nigeria.
Distinctly, this plantation today remains the biggest and most successful oil palm plantation in Ghana, a situation that has arisen as a result of prudent managerial skills and the hard work of the management, staff and outgrowers of the company over the years.
What strikes many visitors to the Kwae plantation in recent times is the vigorous regeneration of the plantation through a replanting exercise. An oil palm plantation is said to have a 20-year cycle, at the end of which period if anybody wants the plantation to continue to be viable, it has to be replanted.
At Kwae, the green landscape offered by the replanting is something that those who cherish an environmentally friendly atmosphere must desire to see. This deliberate replanting exercise explains why most of the state oil palm plantations collapsed after the felling of the trees because the state did not have the wherewithal to undertake such capital and labour intensive exercise. The same elaborate exercise characterised the Kwamoso plantation in the Eastern Region.
The Ghana Oil Palm Development Company (GOPDC) is an integrated agro-industrial company specialising in the organic cultivation of oil palm, the extraction of crude oil and palm kernel oil and refining and fractionation of these produce.
It was initiated by the government in 1975 and privatised in 1995 to a Belgian company, SIAT Ghana Limited, which owned 80 per cent, with the government taking the remaining 20 per cent. However, the GOPDC is now wholly owned by SIAT and two other stakeholders.
The company, which has been able to sustain its lead in the field of oil palm cultivation in the country, currently has more than 21,000 hectares of oil palm plantation at Kwae, with more than 13,000 hectares being developed by over 5,000 outgrowers the company has contracted.
The company, with processing facilities, including a palm oil mill with a capacity of 60 metric tonnes (mt) per hour, a palm kernel crushing plant of 60mt per day, a refinery and fractionation plant with a capacity of 100mt per day and a total storage capacity of more than 13,000mt for finished products, is spread over a vast stretch of land with a radius of 30km.
It also has other facilities, including a tank farm in Tema with a capacity of 8,200mt, with an additional 12,000mt expansion capacity which is almost near completion.
The company’s plantations at the Kwae and the Okumaning estates are all certified organic, as no chemicals, pesticides or herbicides are used, resulting in a healthy superior quality product, making the company’s products attract a bonus on the world market.
The products include crude palm oil, palm kernel oil, palm kernel cake, refined bleached deodorised oil, refined palm kernel oil, free fatty acid, olein and supper olein and stearin.
The company, which planted its first sets of palm trees in 1976 and initiated the cultivation of an organic palm oil plantation in 1999, is already listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) and has created secure income for over 50,000 people.
In 2002, the plantation positioned itself to produce certified organic palm oil and palm kernel oil and since 1977 it has implemented a vast outgrower scheme.
As part of its focus on maintaining its market lead in the oil palm industry, the GOPDC also provides high-yielding seedlings, fertilisers and extension services for farmers on a loan basis and has created 31 collection centres in its catchment area to facilitate the collection of fruits from outgrowers.
Sharing the company’s strategic development with the Daily Graphic, the Managing Director, GOPDC, Mr John C. Inkumsah, said his outfit was fully committed to future sustainable growth of the oil palm business and, therefore, it would ensure that very high quality seeds were nursed and planted.
“The GOPDC is committed to quality products and has equipped its mill and refinery with state-of-the-art laboratory equipment to analyse each processing stage before the products reach consumers, both for domestic and industrial use,” he explained.
The adhere to strict environmental practices to ensure the conservation of the environment, Mr Inkumsah, said his outfit had installed an environmentally friendly 30-metric tonne boiler which produced 2.5 megawatts of electricity, adding that waste generated from the company’s plant was used as fuel for the boiler to reduce pollution.
He indicated that the company obtained 60 per cent of its energy requirement from the boiler, while 30 per cent was being supplied by the Electricity Company of Ghana, with the remaining 10 per cent produced by the genset.
“As part of our conservation action plan with the Ghana Wildlife Society, the management of GOPDC does not only ensure ecological monitoring of its plantation and but also undertakes regular reforestation activities and the planting of cover crops and indigenous trees along rivers within the company catchment areas,” he said, adding that it had also created awareness among its employees, schools and communities within its catchment area and constructed a third treatment pond to avoid any waste spillage.
Mr Inkumsah, who expressed delight at the achievements of the company over the decades, said as part of its corporate social responsibility, the GOPDC had constructed various water projects at Kusi, Anweam, Kwae and Jamestown, while, to improve educational standards in its catchment areas, it had constructed a classroom block at Anweam and a community library at Akwatia.
“We have also provided electricity and street lamps at Okumaning and undertaken the rehabilitation of various stretches of roads in our catchment areas, while we have facilitated the construction of an MTN antenna which has improved mobile phone business at Kwae and its environs,” he stressed.
On challenges, the MD said the company had been paying high sums of GH¢140 to farmers for their produce, an incentive that had attracted other oil palm growers from the Western Region to sell their produce to the company.
“In spite of these motivating prices, some of the outgrowers have always been diverting their produce for domestic consumption and selling it to poachers in neighbouring countries such as Togo who are ready to offer any amount,” he lamented.
He also mentioned the uprooting of seedlings by members of communities within the company’s catchment area.
In the opinion of the GOPDC MD,, Ghana stood to gain enormously if the Government could lend support to the Ghanaian and foreign investors interested in large-scale oil palm plantation, as well as provide subsidies for smallholders in the form of fertilisers and other farm inputs to enable them to expand their farms to lift poor farmers and their dependants from poverty.
“Ghana will not only reap huge foreign exchange from the export of palm oil but also be in a better position to tackle head-on the unemployment problem facing the people,” he stated.
Considering the huge economic potential of oil palm and the enormous employment avenues it can create for the teeming unemployed youth, it is time the Government introduced viable land settlement schemes and provided the necessary support in the form of subsidies as a means to raise landless farmers and smallholders out of poverty, given the fact there are vast tracts of land that are suitable for oil palm plantation in the country.
Furthermore, if the Government is, indeed, determined to increase the country’s foreign exchange and not solely depend on exports of cocoa and other natural resources, the resort to the large-scale cultivation of oil palm, as amply demonstrated in the country by the GOPDC and internationally by Malaysia and Indonesia, which have leaped their developing economies into Asian Tigers, then the diversification of agriculture must be given the needed attention at all cost.
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
RCC DONATES SECOND-HAND CLOTHING TO ORPHANS (PAGE 20, NOV 3)
THE Eastern Regional Co-ordinating Council (RCC) has donated five bails of second-hand clothing to the All Nations Development Agency (ANIDA), a non-governmental organisation (NGO), to support the upkeep of 205 orphaned children under its care.
The items, worth more than GH¢1,000, were in appreciation of the NGO’s commitment to reach out to marginalised and vulnerable children in society.
Presenting the items on behalf of the RRC last Wednesday, the Eastern Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, said the donation was also to complement ANIDA’s project “The Silent Cry”, meant to reach out to underprivileged children who needed care and support.
He commended ANIDA for initiating a child-sponsorship programme through which it had spent not less than GH¢700 on each child per term on their education and general upkeep.
“Admittedly, the plight of these children is very pathetic and worrisome as they really need care, support and compassion to enable them to be well integrated into society,” he said.
Mr Ofosu Ampofo stated that since the plight of the orphaned children could “befall the children of anyone of us, we must all come to the aid of unfortunate children who need our support to become responsible in the future”.
Receiving the items on behalf of the children, the President of ANIDA, Rev. Mrs Rose Donkor, thanked the RCC for the gesture.
The items, worth more than GH¢1,000, were in appreciation of the NGO’s commitment to reach out to marginalised and vulnerable children in society.
Presenting the items on behalf of the RRC last Wednesday, the Eastern Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, said the donation was also to complement ANIDA’s project “The Silent Cry”, meant to reach out to underprivileged children who needed care and support.
He commended ANIDA for initiating a child-sponsorship programme through which it had spent not less than GH¢700 on each child per term on their education and general upkeep.
“Admittedly, the plight of these children is very pathetic and worrisome as they really need care, support and compassion to enable them to be well integrated into society,” he said.
Mr Ofosu Ampofo stated that since the plight of the orphaned children could “befall the children of anyone of us, we must all come to the aid of unfortunate children who need our support to become responsible in the future”.
Receiving the items on behalf of the children, the President of ANIDA, Rev. Mrs Rose Donkor, thanked the RCC for the gesture.
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