Bolgatanga, Nov.27, GNA – Communities along the tributaries of the White Volta are planting trees along the river banks as part of efforts, among others, to check erosion and improve water resource management.
This was revealed at the Kpasenkpe White Volta (WV) sub basin stakeholders’ engagement on plans, proposals, and budgets expected to be implemented in the sub basin and Vea Catchment area under the Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM).
To this effect, a seven-member technical committee constituting Environmental Health of the Bongo District, represented by Mr Mununi Abdulai, the District Assembly Mr David Nar-ire Puobenyire, the Project Coordinator of Blue Deal Ghana by Mr Aaron Aduna, the Water Resources Commission, ICOUR, and Tree Aid have been put together.
The committee is expected to look at conceptualization of the activities by the various actors under the Dutch Water Authority Blue Deal Blue project, a major collaborator of the Water Resource Commission, and help to ensure the procurement of funding to implement the plans.
Among some key proposed plans presented by the Catholic Relief Service(CRS) is the Water Fund In the context of water insecurity in Tamale among other livelihood programmes expected to be carried out to change the way to use and manage water for the benefit of both people and nature.
Mr Jonathan Naaba, the Tree Aid Ghana representative, mentioned the challenges of the Vea dam in the Bongo District and some interventions carried out to desilt the dam, which overflows its banks every year, causing flooding of the communities around.
He said through support of the Water Resources Commission and linkage through the Dutch Water Authority, Blue Deal, Tree Aid was securing funding to implement the Bongo Reforestation project under which 20 communities were provided 55,555 tree seedlings for the project.
Mr Jaap Bos, Head of the Department of Water system of the Dutch Water Authorities known as the ‘Blue Deal Project’ who spoke in an interview with the GNA, said active participation by all stakeholders was key to addressing both the short and long term projects.
He indicated that climate change was influenced by the way people live and added that, “when you don’t have income and continue to carry out farming at the river beds, it increases the impact of the climate change and something has to be done about it, each individual has to contribute to improve the resource”.
Dr Bob Alfa, Director of Planning at Water Resources Commission (WRC) and Coordinator of the dam projects of Blue Deal, outlined the goal of the project to increase access to clean water for the people, improve sanitation and minimize the impact of flooding with key areas being the Vea dam, which is the main source of water for Bolgatanga and surroundings.
He said there was a heavy pollution around the water resources because of farming and other land use activities and, therefore, the need to improve on it for quality of water and noted that setting up of sub basin committees since 2018.
He said due to the challenges of COVID 19 and its impact, there had not been much done and hoped the committee will define the objectives and sell some of the project ideas to attract needed funding for the identified activities.
GNA