On the Frontlines: Ghana Youth Environmental Movement in Climate Action
COVID-19 has been hard on almost all of us. On top of this, climate related disasters have not exactly taken a break amidst the pandemic. In 2020 alone, the Australian wildfires have destroyed lives and property, residents of Nakuru, Kenya were displaced by a major flood. 50,000 people were displaced by a flood in Osaylat, Sudan , and over 70, 000 were affected by a flood in Beni, DRC in May of this year. Although we have heard that global carbon emissions have reduced because of the pandemic (this is debated I must add), the carbon dioxide we have released into the atmosphere for several decades still remains and governments need to implement climate policy to ensure the mitigation of the climate crisis.
If there is anything I’ve learned so far, it is that Climate Change has its own way of exacerbating social inequality by disproportionately affecting the poor. What happens to all these people who have lost their homes now? It is here that we see the need for a climate justice movement that recognizes that the people most affected by climate change are the least responsible for it, and works to correct these inequalities.
A couple of months ago, I came across Gideon Commey, an activist dedicated to climate justice issues, and ensuring that governments are held accountable for climate policy. His vision started the Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (GYEM) , a youth-led environmental policy advocacy and non-violent campaign group in Ghana. Today, I interview him to discover some of the exciting work he and his team have been up to in the environmental advocacy space in Ghana.
What is GYEM? And what inspired you to start this movement?
I was inspired by a number of events on this journey. I was involved in environment work as a teenager with my local church, where I volunteered to educate members on sanitation and waste management. Then as an undergraduate at the University of Ghana, there was a food poisoning incident that hospitalized many students including me, because of poor sanitation at the night market (where students buy food). After this ordeal, I hosted an event on campus to create awareness of the situation.2009 was however a turning point in my activism; I visited Keta in the Volta Region of Ghana, saw the Keta Sea Defense and learned of coastal erosion due to rising sea levels. This led me to learn more about climate change. During my research, I chanced upon Al Gore’s documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” which inspired me to take action on a far bigger scale. In that same year, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, the UK Youth Climate Coalition and other environmental activists were drawing attention to the failure of the 2009 Copenhagen Climate Summit. I also drew inspiration from these groups, spent some time with Occupy Movement in the UK and started off GYEM with a couple of friends in 2012. We actually started laying the building blocks from 2010 but 2012 was when we operationalized GYEM. Permit me to acknowledge some friends who made this dream possible; Lovans, Zico, Buba and Mariama.
What sort of projects have you embarked on?
From 2013 to 2016, we embarked on the “No Coal Campaign”. The Government of Ghana had signed an agreement with the Shenzhen Energy Group of China to construct at 700 MW supercritical coal-fired power plant with coal imports from South Africa. We thought it was a bad idea, considering its social and environmental impact, and the fact that Ghana was part of the conference of parties of the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). Further, coal being a fossil fuel, is a major cause of global warming responsible for climate change. Within those three years of intense campaigning, we held a street press conference, occupied buildings including the Ministry of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) with messages and campaign songs. We put out a couple of press releases and made mass phone calls to the Volta River Authority (VRA) and the EPA informing them that we reject coal. In 2016, we were invited by the VRA for a high-level meeting alongside other environmental groups to discuss the issue and the project was subsequently put on hold.
We also host our annual “Powershift” -the largest youth led environment and climate summit in Ghana, where we look at a pressing environmental issue in our country and then discuss how to respond to it. We have led projects pertaining to water, sanitation and hygiene, plastic waste management and renewable energy which can be found on our website.
Currently, we are running the Ghana Young Environmentalists Programme (GYEP) to empower the next generation of environmentalists and activists in Ghana. GYEP is a 1year program, which will provide young Ghanaians with the knowledge and tools they need to take action on the environment in their communities.
In your opinion, what are some of the most pressing environmental issues we are facing in Ghana today?
Alarming Statistics from Global Forest Watch shows that Ghana is losing its rainforest faster than any other country in the world . Deforestation cannot be separated from illegal mining (Galamsey) because people clear chunks of forest for mining, mostly agricultural lands. Illegal mining also pollutes water bodies. Reports from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and the EPA suggest that we may have to import water in a couple of years if illegal mining is not curbed.
Currently, the government is considering mining bauxite in Atewa Forest which is going to cause massive deforestation as well as a major loss of biodiversity. It will also destroy the water source of 5million Ghanaians.
Then there is climate change, a global problem which cannot be separated from the issues above. We are experiencing drought leading to poor crop yield and food insecurity. Climate change has drastically changed weather and rainfall patterns. I have a small garden in my home where I grow food and I can see how the changes in precipitation have affected my crops. With the heavy rains, then come the floods in urban centers like Accra, a city which is poorly planned with so many impervious surfaces, poor environmental sanitation and a host of disaster risk factors.
Have any of your projects influenced environmental policy in Ghana?
Definitely! As I mentioned before, the Government’s agreement with the Shenzhen Energy Group was halted because of the youth movement campaigning against it. This was a big policy change we inspired, and this raised the profile of the Movement. We have also run an advocacy action to review the Renewable Energy Act 823 (2011) of Ghana. We engaged the Energy Commission and the Ministry of Energy. Consequently, they adopted a few of our suggestions.
Have you experienced any push back towards your work??
Yes, of course! Once you are involved in environmental activism you are definitely going to have that. People will think you are acting in the interest of political players when your agenda is simply to protect the environment and safeguard it for future generations. However, we must say that Ghana is very open to environmental activism so even though there have been a couple of issues, we have been able make our voices heard even in difficult circumstances.
How do we get Ghanaians to be environmentally conscious?
In my several years of activism, one thing I have learned is that education is very important to this Movement. We need education and sensitization about how we view the environment from our traditional Ghanaian perspectives. We often fail to see the connection between how we perceive the environment and who we are as a people. So even though Ghana is a very religious country with different faith groups we do not have any environmental sense of responsibility because there is a disconnect between what we believe and who we are. We do not see the environment as part of us as Africans. It is unfortunate because traditionally, environmental preservation and conservation was our way of life. It is important to educate people to understand what it means to be Ghanaian in terms of environmental consciousness. Although there have been many lost opportunities, we can still reach the younger generation to change their mindset about the environment.
Also, any behavioral or attitudinal change towards the environment would also have to exist within a certain framework of policy and governance, as such, it is important that we put pressure on government to enforce environmentally friendly policies as well.
If there was one Ghanaian environmental issue you could completely eradicate, which one would it be? And why?
I would rather eradicate neoliberalism — the current greed driven global order, which extracts profit from everything and ends up plundering the environment and condemning masses to poverty. I believe this is the root of our environmental problems. The climate emergency, species extinction, loss of biodiversity, and the major environmental challenges we have start from neoliberalism.
But of course, like I said earlier on, in Ghana, both government and citizens have a role to safeguard the environment.
Where do you see GYEM in 10 years?
When we founded GYEM, we wanted to build the strongest and largest youth led environmental group in Ghana, and we are still on that vision. We want to continue winning campaigns and engaging leaders and policies. The goal is to build a movement whose power and size is commensurate to the challenges we have. We want to give the youth a voice to move policy in the right direction to benefit people and environment.
What have some of your lowest points been?
Some of the decisions that the government has made concerning the environment have been a big blow to us. Decisions concerning coal powered energy and mining bauxite in the pristine Atewa forest are very disappointing, especially considering that our current and immediate past presidents have both served as global co-chairs of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Advocates. They are supposed to stand for environmental protection but that is not the case. When things like this happen, it often feels like you do not have enough support from those who can make the big decisions on the environment. This lack of support, as well as inadequate resources affect our work.
African countries (like Ghana) do very little to contribute to the harmful effects of climate change we are facing today. What steps do you think we can take as a country to help curb this on the international front?
Climate justice cannot be fixed on just one continent. Over the last two years, Ghana has created a bad reputation for itself by being the country with the most depleted rain forest. Even though our carbon emissions may not be as significant, we have to act on climate change. We should reduce our carbon footprint and implement the Nationally Determined Contributions that we committed to during the Paris Agreement .
I understand that we have been given $US54.5m from the Green Climate Fund to address deforestation and forest degradation in the Northern Savannah Zone, as well as invest in the shea value chain and empower women through the Shea Landscape Emission Project. Government should make sure this funding is utilized to make the desired impact. Government recently also launched the National Adaptation Plan which will prioritize effective climate change adaptation. This is a nice policy, but it has to be implemented effectively to change and improve lives. We need action not just policies and activists ought to put pressure on decision makers to ensure that they do their job.
The Ghana Youth Environmental Movement is doing some fantastic work in the environmental advocacy space in Ghana. To learn more, you can check out their social media handles and website.
Twitter: @gyemgh
Facebook: Ghana Youth Environmental Movement
Website: https://gyemgh.org/
