{"id":3760,"date":"2019-06-27T14:04:38","date_gmt":"2019-06-27T14:04:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aptnewsghana.com\/?p=3760"},"modified":"2019-06-27T14:04:38","modified_gmt":"2019-06-27T14:04:38","slug":"when-the-last-tree-dies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aptnewsghana.com\/index.php\/2019\/06\/27\/when-the-last-tree-dies\/","title":{"rendered":"When the last tree dies…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Farmers\u00a0across the country are lamenting climate change is\u00a0destroying their livelihoods\u00a0and making it\u00a0difficult for them to feed their families.\u00a0Driven mainly by deforestation, the changing climate is causing the rains to fall less in communities. And when it falls, it\u2019s\u00a0usually so heavy it triggers flooding. And the weather pattern has become unpredictable.<\/p>\n

A century ago, Ghana had more than 8.2 million hectares of forests but that has been depleted to about 1.6 million now. According to the Forestry Commission<\/a>, about 65,000 hectares of forests are degraded every year. The farmers are feeling the pinch of this.<\/p>\n

\u201cFormerly, you see this forest range, it was helping the community. But this time, because they\u00a0have gone into the forest to cut\u00a0some of the woods, you can see now the pattern has changed and we don’t have enough rain,\u201d Isaac Kwabena, a farmer\u00a0in\u00a0the Volta region told Joy news\u2019 Hotline documentary.\u00a0\u201cThat is a great problem; sometimes you go to the farm and you even don’t like to work because the sun has scorched everything,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

At Mafi Akukorkpo in the Volta region, farmers complain the poor rainfall pattern is leaving crops rotting in the field. Blewusi Aziedorme, a farmer lamented cassava they had planted 14 months ago was still in the fields despite the fact that it\u2019s matured and was ready for harvest about five months ago.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe ground is too hard. It’s not raining and that is why we can’t uproot the cassava. But previously, the rain came as was expected,\u201d he told Joy News.<\/p>\n

In nearby Adaklu Kpetsu, charcoal burning is a brisk business. They cut down trees in the enclave to burn into charcoal.\u00a0\u201cA bag of charcoal can be sold for 90\u00a0cedis during the rainy season, so it’s good business. It’s more profitable than farming,\u201d\u00a0Akoto Christian, a resident said. His work is harmful to the forest and vegetation. But as far as Christian and many others in this community are concerned, this\u00a0is what\u00a0feeds a lot of families in this area. It doesn\u2019t matter that the resulting impact on the environment.<\/p>\n

In the absence of trees and the forests<\/a>, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere increases. This traps a lot of heat in the air, thus interrupting the development of\u00a0rainfall\u00a0clouds. And when eventually the rain comes, it\u2019s heavy, causing floods. This\u00a0also\u00a0results in an unpredictable rainfall pattern.\u00a0\u201cWhatever you do, is a cause and effect relationship.\u00a0So the more damage you cause, the more impact we face from climate change,\u201d Glen Asomaning who is Director of Operations at Nature and Development Foundation\u00a0(NDF)\u00a0explained.<\/p>\n

The impact of the act of deforestation and illegal logging is bigger than just climate change. As the illegal timber merchants move the illegally cut trees through\u00a0the\u00a0forests, they end up destroying the farms of ordinary farmers. Daniel Odame, a cocoa farmer in the Jasikan District lost 2,000 cedis after illegal loggers destroyed his two-acre cocoa farm.\u00a0\u201cThey came and fell some trees on my cocoa farm.\u00a0I chased them but to no avail because I don’t know where they came from. It wasn’t easy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Another victim of this destruction in the Jasikan District is\u00a0Kwabena Morgan, cocoa, maize and plantain farmer.\u00a0\u201cSometimes they will come, tell you that they need one tree, two trees but all of a sudden, you will see five, six\u00a0trees on\u00a0the farm destroyed,\u201d\u00a0he said.\u00a0His community was\u00a0recently\u00a0left in darkness for three days after trees cut down by illegal loggers brought down electric poles.<\/p>\n

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As a result of the destructions being caused to the environment, food has become expensive in a lot of these\u00a0areas. Residents say\u00a0the price of maize, for example, has shot up by about 50% over the last year\u00a0because of poor rains and destroyed farms.\u00a0\u201cFoodstuff has been reduced, productivity is low,\u00a0and income\u00a0generation is also very\u00a0low. The cost\u00a0of food has\u00a0gone very\u00a0high,\u201d\u00a0Coordinator\u00a0of the Volta Regional Farmers Forum Kofi Yiadom\u00a0told Joy News.<\/p>\n

Water bodies are also bearing the brunt of these illegal logging activities. In the Dodi Pepeso area\u00a0in the Volta region, the Esoko Oyaa River which stretches into the Oti and Volta Rivers is brownish after it was polluted by the operations of the illegal loggers. They tie ropes around the cut woods and drag them through the river, polluting it. Kennedy Akroma\u00a0who\u00a0is a\u00a0traditional leader in the area says it\u2019s sad that \u201cthey are destroying the\u00a0river just to make money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Up north, the yam business which provides jobs for thousands in farming and trading is being hit badly by\u00a0poor weather patterns. On the farm fields,\u00a0plants are wilting\u00a0and yams are rotting.\u00a0\u201cBecause it was not raining,\u00a0the yam has\u00a0gotten rotten in the mound\u2026\u00a0If there were to be rain, there would have been more leaves on it,\u201d\u00a0Diwati David Yajedo, a local farmer lamented.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver\u00a0a\u00a03 to 5 year\u00a0period,\u00a0we get one or two rains at the beginning of the year. Farmers rush\u00a0in\u00a0to\u00a0prepare their yam and plant. Then there\u00a0is a dry sprout for another two months and then\u00a0the yam gets rotten in the\u00a0mound. So at the end of the day, the number of sprouts that they get in the field is less than they have\u00a0planted. So the change in the\u00a0rain pattern is actually affecting the production of yam,\u201d\u00a0Plant Breeder at the\u00a0Savannah\u00a0Agricultural Research Institute (SARI), Dr Emmanuel Chamba\u00a0explained.<\/p>\n

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Diwati\u00a0who has a 10-acre farm\u00a0lost about \u00a25,000 last year\u00a0to this phenomenon.\u00a0\u201cI lost\u00a0more than \u00a25,000. In fact, almost all of them got rotten in the yam mound,\u201d he said. Jonathan Nabia, also a yam\u00a0farmer lost \u00a22,000 to poor weather last season.\u00a0\u201cI don’t know\u00a0the weather\u2026\u00a0but the rain doesn’t come.\u00a0The yam\u00a0I\u00a0planted\u00a0is now dying. For the money I\u00a0have lost, it\u2019s about \u00a22,000 plus,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Sulemana Issifu\u00a0who is\u00a0with the Center for Climate Change and Food Security\u00a0says\u00a0the situation is troubling.\u00a0\u201cThe north is a very volatile area. We know that they are\u00a0at the two extremes\u00a0of weather conditions;\u00a0when it’s rainy, a flood occurs and when it’s dry,\u00a0it is very severe. And the kind of extremity we have seen in the last two years, it can be nothing more than the consequences of climate change.\u00a0And when that happens, we know\u00a0plants cannot survive,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

Cocoa,\u00a0Ghana\u2019s most important cash crop\u00a0is also feeling the impact of climate change. A forty-year-old\u00a0cocoa farmer in Sefwi Frank Aduhene explains heavy sunshine burns young pods annually, thereby reducing yield. He says the situation cost him about 20 bags of cocoa last season.\u00a0\u201cLast year,\u00a0because of climate change, I got\u00a033 bags\u00a0from my field instead of 50\u00a0because the sun scorched the pods,\u201d he said.\u00a0\u201cWhen we started farming here, there were lots of trees on the field but the timber merchants came and cut them all on the authority of the land owner\u2026 That is why this is happening,\u201d\u00a0Mr Aduhene\u00a0said.<\/p>\n

The risk climate change poses to the cocoa sector is even greater. The projection is that rainfall in a lot of\u00a0cocoa growing areas will decline by 2% in the year 2020 and 11% in 2050 and result in a 14% and 28% decline in cocoa yield respectively. By 2080, moisture is predicted to be inadequate for profitable cocoa production in Ghana if the current trend continues.<\/p>\n

The ideas on possible solutions are several. Dr\u00a0Emmanuel\u00a0Chamba\u00a0of SARI\u00a0advocates for the adoption of improved, drought-resistant seeds. \u201cIt means we\u00a0have\u00a0to be developing varieties that will be fit into these shrinking rainy season.\u00a0So we should be thinking of drought resisting seeds,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Even fishing activities are being hampered by climate change as Head of the Department of Marine and Fisheries\u00a0Sciences at the University of Ghana\u00a0Dr Angela Lamptey,\u00a0points out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey go to sea and they\u00a0can’t find fish because most of them have either been affected by climate change or changes in the environment or migrated to near-by water bodies where conditions are more favourable. So this brings about food security issues. When the temperature is not favourable, fishes will not\u00a0reproduce,\u201d Dr Lamptey said.<\/p>\n

Director of the Institute for Environmental and Sanitation Studies at the University of Ghana Prof. Kwasi Appeaning Addo says a concerted effort is needed to tackle the problem, else the entire nation is at risk.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a country, we can help reduce the impact of climate change by ensuring that we maintain the forest. You know,\u00a0we also need to embark on tree planting and as much as possible activities that will reduce carbon dioxide in the system should be encouraged,\u201d he advised.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s everybody\u2019s business to ensure that the current rate of deforestation stops. \u00a0Maybe someday when the reality of the destructive effect of climate change becomes inevitable, we will understand this old native American saying that;\u00a0\u201cit is when the last tree has been cut down, when the last fish is caught, and the last river poisoned, only then will we realize that one cannot eat money.\u201d<\/p>\n

Below is the link to the full video documentary<\/p>\n