Affluent Pay Less For Water Service

Poor people in urban centres pay more for water compared to the affluent in society, according to a consultant helping the Ministries of Water Resources, Works and Housing and Local Government and Rural Development to develop a national strategy for the water sector. Patrick Apoya said the problem had persisted because poor people depend on secondary providers rather than the Ghana Water Company for water. At the launch of the strategy co-sponsored by the USAID and CHF International, which was aimed at getting underprivileged communities involved in urban services, Mr. Apoya said third party suppliers and vendors, who are the main source of water for poor households, charge as high as 10 to 20 times than the approved tariffs. He said services rendered to households are poor and unreliable. He attributed the situation to weaknesses in governance structure and said urban water and sanitation hygiene services needs to be strengthened without delay. Senyo Amengor, Acting Managing Director of Ghana Urban Water Limited, told CITY & BUSINESS after the launch of the project that the households pay 83 pessewas per one meter cubic, representing 1000 litres of water. “When you are connected for domestic use we charge 83 pessewas per 1 meter cube those who are poor in terms of access to water have to pay more because they do not have direct access to our pipelines.” He said the growing urban population was making water supply services cumbersome, explaining that “the planning of the water supply system was done when the demand was not much higher and we doing our best to match our systems with the growth of the population.” Dr. Sumani Alhassan, Director of Water Directorate of the Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, in a speech read on his behalf, noted that Ghana was experiencing rapid urbanization, adding that government was struggling to cope with the increasing demand for water and sanitation and hygiene services. He explained that though 51 per cent of the population live in urban areas only 64 percent of them have access to improved water supply. Before launching the strategy, Deputy Minister for the Ministry of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Nii Nortey Dua stated that the current Ghana Water Company Limited delivery approach does not clearly define the role of communities and non-state actors in water provision. “There is the need to create the environment for innovative community management that will synergize with operations of Ghana Water Company Limited,” he said. He expressed the hope that the national strategy would address the problem. The Country Director of CHF said the objective of his organization which has been in Ghana for the past three years is to increase access of households to affordable, improved and sustainable drinking water and strengthen local governance for water supply and sanitation services delivery.

Feeling The Heat

Rising temperature has caused behavioural changes in residents of Akosombo in the Eastern region of Ghana. “These days you need an umbrella to protect you from the excessive heat from the sun when you move around in the afternoon,” said 28 year-old Harriet Awiakye, a resident of Asukwuo, a suburb of Akosombo. “The rooms are very hot at night. We sweat a lot and heat rashes are very common here now. This was not the case when we were growing up,” Ms Awiakye added. Like most residents of Akosombo, Sampson Asare, a Senior High School graduate, is unable to link the rising temperature to the increasingly threatening phenomenon- global warming and rather attributes it to the presence of the Akosombo hydroelectric dam. “I think the dam produces so much heat in the process of generating electricity,” said Sampson Asare, who moved to Akosombo from Kumasi seven months ago, in his quest to explain the development. But not every body is ignorant of climate change. Stephen Dei, a waiter at the Volta Hotel in Akosombo, who has been residing in the community for more than two decades, observed that the heat is not limited to the environs of the dam. “It is part of the general changes in climate all over the world,” he noted. Mr. Dei said the rainfall pattern in Akosombo has also changed. “For about six years now, we have been having less rainfall at the beginning of the season. Unlike previous times when we would have had several days of rain, this year we have had only two rains since February.” “Now, most farmers of maize and cassava have migrated further inland to areas where the rainfall is more frequent and more reliable,” Mr Dei added. Climate change, a global problem, is caused by the concentration of greenhouse gases produced through human activities such as burning fossil fuels. It is mainly caused by industry and transport; deforestation, agricultural activities and a growing population. This has caused environmental degradation and natural disasters which contribute to poverty in affected regions. Dr. Delali Dovie of the Regional Institute of Population Studies, University of Ghana, told this reporter that historical data for Ghana from 1961 to 2000 clearly showed a progressive rise in temperature and decrease in the average annual rainfall. “The average annual temperature is estimated to have increased by one degree Celsius over the period and is expected to rise further over the future,” said Dr Dovie. He noted that in addition to rising temperatures and declining rainfall totals, climate change has led to rising sea levels, disasters such as flooding. Dr Dovie noted that climate change, which is caused by the contamination of the blanket of air above the earth’s surface with toxic substances such as smog, fumes, is a development challenge. The researcher called for financial assessment of the impact of climate change in the country to identify how much the nation is losing to the phenomenon. He said Ghana has failed to undertake a financial appraisal of the toll of climate change. The country has only been featured partially on a pilot basis in a global study by the World Bank. Dr Dovie revealed that it is important to assess the financial implications of climate change, as it is impacting all sectors of the economy. “For example, in a sector like energy if we do not have water in the Akosombo Dam to generate power it would mean we have to shut down and that would affect industry as well as households. “If we are not careful we may have people losing their jobs and that would mean production going down and revenue generated will definitely reduce.” “All these combined is a developmental threat as far as climate change is concerned,” he added, emphasizing that the nation has to know what it is losing as a result of climate change. Ghana is experiencing some leakages but we have not put financial value to it. He said the agricultural sector is a major source of income for more than a half of the nation’s working population. But farmers are compelled to depend on the unpredictable rainfall as agriculture in Ghana is still rain fed. The changes in the rainfall pattern have resulted in declining production. “For a fact we know we have a lot of subsistence farmers who depend solely on farming and yet we have agric been rain fed, which means we should be concerned when we do not have the rains falling on time, which could lead to poor yields and diminishing income.” Agriculture production, he explained, has been severely compromised due to loss of land, shorter growing seasons and more uncertainty about what and when to plant. “This is worsening food insecurity and increase in the number of people at risk from hunger,” he observed. Yield from rain fed crops could be halved by 2020 in some countries “if nothing is done.” He recommended climate change mitigation actions to decrease the intensity of emissions in order to reduce the potential effects of global warming.

Indian Investors Focus On Ghana

Ghana’s economy continues to attract more investors as Indian business delegations tour the country to explore business opportunities lately.

Rajinder Bhagat, the new Indian High Commissioner to Ghana made this known during a courtesy call on Mike Hammah, Minister for Lands and Natural Resources at his office to introduce himself and discuss possible areas of co-operation between India and Ghana.

He observed that the country is gradually being transformed into a hub of business and commerce in the West African sub-region.

High Commissioner Bhagat announced that the Indian government would increase its technical training programme to cover 150 Ghanaians instead of the previous 125 Ghanaians.

He explained that his government projects to use the technical training programme to help develop the capacity of personnel of the Land administration project under the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources.



Welcoming the High Commissioner, Ghana’s Minster of Lands and Natural Resources called for the strengthening of the long-standing relations for the mutual benefit of the two countries and expressed the hope that Ghana would tap into the experiences and lessons of the India.

The Minister, who briefed the High Commissioner on processes in acquiring land in Ghana for industrial purposes, assured the Indian envoy that the Ministry will provide the requisite assistance to Indian investors interested in acquiring land for businesses in Ghana.

Recounting the history of land administration in Ghana, Mr Hammah explained that the Land Administration Project has strengthened institutional capacity of the Lands Commission to curb the numerous conflicts between various traditional areas through the demarcation of customary boundaries.

Prior to his posting to Ghana in December 2011, High Commissioner Bhagat served in the Indian Missions in Damascus, Jeddah/Riyadh, Mexico City, Sana’a, The Hague, Port of Spain, Doha.

He also served at the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi in various capacities and was posted to Mozambique and Swaziland as High Commissioner of India.

He held the post of Head of the West Africa Division in the Ministry.

Dealing With Bad Work Habits

When it comes to work, you have no excuse to allow any other thing to distract you.

Many people engage in various activities which do not help them to achieve their objectives. Constantly checking email,Facebook or Twitter

Social networking sites have become the biggest challenge of most employees these days.

Are you one of those who can not stay away from your personal email account and social networking sites?

Most workers usually surf social networking sites such as facebook, Youtube, My Space, Twitter immediately they sit behind their desks.

Some workers have become addicted to some of these social networking sites and spend so many working hours browsing, updating, commenting or either posting comments or pictures.

An expert, David Rock Drof, author of “Your Brain at Work” says social interaction is addictive because it activates the rewards center of our brains and that connecting to people is similar to eating chocolate.

“The more you do it, the more you want it,” he explained. “That’s when it becomes distracting.”

No employer would be happy to see staff using working hours to surf their personal facebook pages or twitter.

As a result most employees send e-mails under the pretext of surfing the internet.

Mr. Drof advised that “work for say an hour, and then allow yourself to check in quickly as a treat.

However experts have advised users of social networking sites to be careful about what they put there.

A word of warning: Think twice before you post about work matters on social networking sites. These sites frequently change their privacy settings, so users must be careful as their page may be publicly broadcasted without their knowledge.

You write-and send-work emails too hastily

Does you work require you to write and send e-mails? Then please take your time to read through what you write before you hit on the send bottom.

Sometimes you may be caught doing two things at the same time. Well some people may be ambidextrous and would be good at handling several tasks.

The main challenge is that you may be in a haste to finish with what you are doing in order to leave the office on time or have some spare time to yourself for other activities.

Most people fail to read through their e-mails which are often written in haste. If you misspell or make grammatical errors in your e-mail you make it difficult for the receiver to understand the message.

Such a message may be confusing and offensive to the person at the receiving end.

You must cross check spellings, grammar, punctuations and remember that you are communicating and it can only be effective if the receiver is able to encode the message.

“If you feel uncertain about your message, save it as a draft and come back to it later,” suggests Dr. Rock.

Not only will this give you time to work off anger, but it may also allow you to add helpful information to the email, which can make you come across as capable and thoughtful.

But keep Dr. Rock’s rule in mind: “Anything that is likely to generate strong emotion should be a phone or face-to-face conversation.”

3. Are You too involved in office politics?

At the workplace, people form informal groups to achieve various objectives.

People associate with others such as their supervisors, heads of department or employers to obtain special favours.

In such social groupings, gossiping become inevitable spending too much time dissecting workplace dynamics can harm your reputation.

Instead of worrying about who said what to whom, devote that energy to work. Note that the more you concentrate on work, the less time you will have for petty gossip.

If you spend most of your day handling minor assignments, you won’t have energy to attend to equally important duties.

4. Running late Always

“People are most often behind schedule because they’re not thinking about how long it takes to get from point A to point B, or because they leave things until the last minute,” says Dr. Rock.

You will become less reliable if you repeatedly miss deadlines.

Dr. Rock recommends scheduling them for 50 minutes instead of 60.

And if you are chronically late to meet deadlines or other appointments, Goodman advises setting alerts on either your phone or watch.

You can also set your clocks forward a few minutes to help you be on time.

5. Dealing with difficult coworkers

A negative attitude can affect your performance at work as it can negatively the implementation of your ideas.

Others who have a negative attitude can mar all your efforts at meeting targets.

In other words, a doom-and-gloom attitude will affect your creativity.

The good news is that even though you can not change every one, there are a few things you can change.

The first step is to focus on what you can improve and try to see everything in a positive light.

That will require avoiding co-workers who provoke you.

Start the day on a happy note and try and look cheerful.

The more cheerful your attitude, the less you will complain about.

The more you grumble, the more likely it is that people, like your superiors and your loudmouth colleagues at the workplace, will frustrate you.



5. No break For Lunch
Sometimes it’s good to take a break.

You should be worried about the health risks posed by sitting in the same position and in the same environment for a very long time.

It is good to step out and take some fresh air.

‘Don’t Blame Customs’

MAJOR-GENERAL Carl Modey, Commissioner of the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), has said his outfit is not responsible for the undue delay in the clearance of goods at the country’s ports.

“We really like the public to understand that we are not making it difficult for anybody,” he emphasised in an interview with BUSINESS GUIDE in Accra.

For years, importers have impugned the image of the Customs Division, which was previously known as Customs Excise & Preventive Service (CEPS) and blamed officials for delaying the clearance of goods at the ports.

Importers claimed their goods at the port attract high demurrage – a charge applied for storage of laden containers. Demurrage is also applied after a designated free time.

Importers at the country’s ports have complained of rigid clearing procedures which do not help them in any way.

However, Major-General Modey explained that other agencies such as the Ghana Ports & Habours Authority (GPHA), Narcotic Control Board, among others, also played a role in the clearance of goods at the port.

“They should not blame Customs, we only play a small part at the port but they end up putting all the blame on us if they are not able to clear their goods for them.”

He therefore advised importers to ensure that all documents covering their goods were genuine.

“We have always advised them to have the appropriate invoices and it is the recalcitrant ones who suffer.”

The Commissioner of the Customs Division hinted that measures were being put in place to ensure that importers cleared their goods within two days for non-golden card holders.

Customs Division of the GRA, he said, was trying to conduct all transactions electronically, adding: “We are trying to go paperless to ensure that the interface between our officers and the public is reduced to zero.”

According to George Blankson, Commissioner of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA), his outfit had introduced a golden card holder system for importers that would allow them to clear their goods in a day.

He said it formed part of measures to block leakages in the goods clearance system at the country’s ports.

According to him, GRA intended to collect as much revenue for the state and therefore was keen to firmly block all chances by bad nuts in the service to perpetrate any evil motives.

He added that GRA had put measures in place to ensure that it did not compromise on the services it offered to taxpayers.

By Emelia Ennin Abbey

Conversation on Corporate Social Responsibility starts

The Centre for Corporate Responsibility (CCR) of the University of Ghana Business School (UGBS) has held its first Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) stakeholders workshop under the theme “A Conversation on CSR in Ghana” in Accra.
The CCR was established under a cooperation agreement between the UGBS and the Centre for Cooperation with the Private Sector (CCPS) of the GIZ, South Africa.
Dr. Dan Ofori, Coordinator of the CCR and a Senior Lecturer and Head of the Department of Organisation & HRM of the UGBS, who was the facilitator, affirmed that the Centre’s mission is to create a new generation of business leaders who are knowledgeable and committed to Corporate Social Responsibility by inspiring current and future managers with the passion for responsible corporate leadership.
He explained that the Centre aims to equip managers with the skills and outlook to put sustainability and responsibility at the heart of their operations by integrating Corporate Social Responsibility behaviour within organisations.
Dr. Ofori reiterated that the Centre would execute its mandate through the creation, dissemination, facilitation and application of CSR knowledge for various stakeholder groups in the private, public and non-governmental sectors.
The CCR’s key thematic areas, he noted, include Streamlining Corporate Responsibility into Business Operations, Business and Human Rights, Business and the Environment, Anti-Corruption, Transparency & Business Ethics, Partnerships in Local Supply Chains, Promoting & Hindering Factors for CSR, and CSR Disclosure, Reporting & Audit.


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Abandoned Vessels Overtake Ghana's Coast

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is unhappy with the growing number of abandoned vessels along Ghana’s coast which it noted was degrading the environment.
Some cargo, tanker and fishing vessels, mostly located at Prampram and close to the Tema Habour, have been abandoned.

Young men, who call themselves scavengers, usually rip them into pieces to sell as scrap.

The activities of the youth threaten the lives of the people in community.

A team from EPA that toured Prampram where another vessel, MT Navgator, has recently been spotted was astonished by the level of the illegal activities along the shore.
MT Navgator was seen along the coast close to Prampram in November, and was being ripped into pieces when the EPA served notice for work to stop after the media highlighted the issue.



Moses Adams, a scavenger working on the vessel, told journalists that he was contracted by Integral Marine, a local scarp company which bought the vessel suspected to have been abandoned on the high seas for five years.

He said it was formally at the Dry Dock at the Tema Habour but was moved to Prampram after securing approval from the traditional authority.

DSP Abraham Kwawu, Prampram District Commander, who is ensuring that the EPA order is carried out, disclosed in an interview that all the other vessels were there accidentally as a result of shipwreck with the exception of two vessels.
Journalists were showed a vessel believed to have conveyed Tata buses to Ghana some 25 years ago.

Hudu Issak, who cut and sold almost half of another tanker vessel, MT Biera, said they would need another month to dismantle the whole vessel estimated to generate over GH¢40,000.



A letter dated August 11, 2011 and signed by Captain James Owusu-Koranteng, Habour Master on behalf of the Director of the Tema Port and copied to the Port Security Coordinator, Naval Base Commander and the Ghana Maritime Authority, gave permit to remove the vessels from the Tema anchorage to Prampram.

Irene Heathcote, Director at EPA Accra East Regional office, told CITY & BUSINESS GUIDE that the presence of the vessels threatens the security of the area.

“They are supposed to be at the dry dock. There are social and environmental hazards associated with these activities.”

She said apart from degrading the shores, the scavengers use gas and dynamite to blast the vessels.



Lambert Faabeluon, Director of Manufacturing and Industry Department of the EPA, explained that the sea could be contaminated with alien species.
“If this activity is not stopped we will be opening our doors for others and gradually our shores would be turned into something else...”
Key stakeholders including the Navy, Ghana Maritime Authourity, Ghana Ports and Habour Authority, National Security, EPA would be holding a meeting to discuss the issue today.