As part of measures to secure the country’s landing sites and landscape of the marine ecosystem across the various costal lines in Ghana from encroachment, Hen-Mpoano is currently working to register all landing sites nationwide.
The aim is to ward of pressure from the tourism industry and other developmental projects that are currently taken over the costal lines.
Speaking at a stakeholder engagement workshop, the Project Manager of Hen-Mpoano,, Mr. Justice Camillus Mensah, said the fish landing sites in Ghana are suffering from pressure as a result of climate change issues leading to rising sea levels and causing costal erosion.
Mr. Mensah said apart from the costal erosion, the sector is also competing with the hospitality industry where a number of landing sites across the country are been converted to resorts and hotels and the springing up development on the coast every day.
“At a time as a country where we are looking at fish sustainability, it is prudent we consider the sustainability of our landing sites and the livelihood support of fisher folks who are engaged in the business.”
The workshop is aimed at socializing the work done in the past interns of securing these landing sites for fisher folks and again looking at ways to scale up to reach more of these landing sites currently under stressed.
The Project Manager noted that in the past, through European Union founded product, “we were able document six landing sites all the way to cadestral or indenture level so this one is the continuation to the registry and also added at least new four landing sites to at least 10.”
“Beyond this, the project is aimed at developing a national policy on how to manage and protect these landing sites and the landscape in the entire costal belt. This is why we are having these series of stakeholder engagement, which first started in the Western Region, Central, Volta, today in Accra and the national stakeholder engagement to consolidate from what we are getting from this strategy,” he stated.
On how to use the legal framework to secure these landing sites, he added that in the past the project mapped closed to 118 landing sites because if you want to protect something you first need to know where it is and beyond the mapping is what we are doing the stakeholder engagement and working with the communities on the various protocols for the processes.
The startegy is that because the project is a community-based, right from the mapping it was participatory and it implementation is a community centered and we are going to support so to ensure it sustainability beyond the project period, we are empowering the communities to drive the process.
Hεn Mpoano is a not-for-profit organization legally registered in Ghana since 2013 and based in Takoradi in the Western Region.
Between 2009 to 2013, the organization existed and operated as Coastal Resources Center- Ghana, with affiliation to the Coastal Resources Center of the University of Rhode Island, USA. During this period, Hεn Mpoano led the implementation of the USAID-funded Integrated Coastal and Fisheries Governance (ICFG) Initiative for the Western Region of Ghana.
Upon closure of the ICFG project, Hεn Mpoano became a registered organization with a mission towards continuing many of the initiatives related to coastal and marine governance begun under the project.
