Climate change policy requires private sector engagement
Dr Emmanuel Tachie-Obeng, the Senior Programme Officer, at the Environmental Protection Agency has said the National Climate Change Policy (NCCP) required private sector engagement.
He said the policy also required investment from the sector to build climate resilient for the future.
Dr Tachie-Obeng was speaking during the 5th General Agriculture Workers Union (GAWU) and Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) Climate Change Conference in Accra.
This year’s conference is on the theme: “Trade Union Perspectives on strategies for rolling out Ghana’s NCCP”.
The conference, in collaboration with GAWU and FES, was to interrogate the strategies for rolling out the NCCP, with the view to develop trade union perspectives.
He said options to reduce impacts of climate change are well defined in the policy and its strategic steps, adding that, it was not the responsibility of government alone to advocate on climate change.
The Senior Programme Officer said the agriculture programme areas in the NCCP included institutional capacity development of research and dissemination, development and promotion of climate resilient cropping system and supporting adaptation in the fisheries sub-sector.
The rest are supporting water conservation and irrigation system and improving post-harvest management.
He called on trade unions to organize themselves and conduct focused research in the areas of climate change to enhance awareness creation.
He urged the leadership of trade unions to educate members to desist from destroying the forest and invest in insurance and water storage among others.
“Change the old ways of investment and invest in the strategies of the policy,” he added.
Mr Kingsley Ofei Nkansah, General Secretary of GAWU said the conference would help the union to identify how best they could support the strategies in the NCCP.
He said at the last conference of the GAWU and FES collaboration, it identified the implications of the NCCP on decent work and employment creation.
Source: GNA