By Lydia Kukua Asamoah/Emmanuel Todd, GNA
Accra, Feb 20, GNA - The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has reconstituted the Climate Change Response Measures Working Group and Technical Session, to lead discussions and implementation of policy issues pertaining to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
The Committee made up of representatives from frontline institutions within the public and private sectors such as Trade Union Congress, Gender Ministry, SSNIT, Ghana Employers Association, Energy Commission and other MMDAs, is also tasked to help the country advance its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) by 2020.
NDCs are countries contribution to global efforts to deal with climate change serving as key tools for measuring what each country is doing in the fight against climate change and reduction of harmful global emissions, which is the heart of the Paris Climate Change Agenda, adopted in 2015.
Response measures are said to be the safeguards of climate mitigation for the future.
Ghana has 31 NDCs, expected to be implemented as response measures to climate change impact affecting the countries in the areas of agriculture production, coastal activities, weather patterns, among others, all impacting on the socio-economic development of the nation.
At the reconstituted meeting held in Accra on Wednesday, Mr Ebenezar Ampah-Sampon, Deputy Executive Director in charge of Technical Service, EPA, said Ghana needed capable and accountable institutions and individuals to help Ghana implement its commitment towards climate actions.
He said there was the need for coherent climate policies as well as grass root involvement and knowledgeable actors to enable Ghana “transition to a climate-proof society”.
Mr Ampah-Sampong emphasised the need for predictable financing to cater for the 31 NDCs that cut across seven economic indicators, which were critical for the sustenance of the Ghana’s economy that is a natural resource based.
He said the Committee was therefore, being revived to generate the needed measures and policy for climate mitigation, looking at cross border trade, local air quality, and technological transfer, among others, to ensure a resilient economy.
Mrs Angelina Ama Tutuwa Mensah, Public Relations Director at EPA who doubles as a Climate Change Negotiator, said among the agenda items of the response measures are mitigation action in the areas of energy, mass transportation, or waste issues to help reduce the impact of emissions in the country.
She said the NDCs were basically response measures to climate change, as previous concerns had become the issue of all countries that are parts of climate negotiators.
“So, this committee is put up to make sure we comply and meet up with these concerns by 2020”.
She explained that the Committee would be looking at the issues of modelling and developing tools and methodologies that would enable Ghana to implement its NDCs, to benefit all sectors that would suffer the impact of the global phenomenon.
Mrs Mensah explained that the area of employment would suffer most, saying the climate change impact and the transition to low carbon economy would lead to some job losses and so there would be the need to retrain and build capacities of people to move along the transition.
Dr Daniel Tutu Benefoh, Principal Officer at the Climate Change Unit, EPA said the impact of climate was becoming dire on countries like Ghana in the areas of farming, coastal settlements, airfreighted goods, tourism among others.
“It is really threatening the way we live and our kind of life and so we need to take concrete actions that will help us to survive”.
He said World Bank studies had concluded that in Ghana, the total cost of environmental degradation in development was about 9.5 per cent of Gross Domestic Products (GDP).
He said Ghana would therefore need about 10 of its GDP on cleaning the environment of waste generated, and the environment could be freed of the pollutions by following sustainable transition pathways and switching to solar PV, sustainable Forest, and use of electric cars, premium export commodities and smart agriculture.
GNA
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