President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo says Ghana’s timber industry is suffering as a result of the depletion of the country’s forest reserves.
Nana Akufo-Addo says Ghana has in the last 10 years lost over 100,000 acres of natural forest through human activities.
Speaking at the Green Ghana Day event, which seeks to plant 20 million trees across the country, President Akufo-Addo urged Ghanaians to support the project as it will go a long way to help fight climate change.
“In the last three decades alone, the world has lost 1,137,846,602 acres of forest, more than 10% of the current total forest area. Per the current data we have, we are losing 150 acres of rainforest every single minute, 200,000 acres a day, and 79 million acres a year. Here in Ghana, we have lost some 100,000 acres of natural forest in the last decade alone. Our timber industry is suffering.”
“The forest is also home to most of the earth’s terrestrial biodiversity and crucial to our fight against climate change. The climate crisis is reaching a tipping point. We have been advised by the parish agreement to keep global temperatures below 1.5 degrees Celsius.”
The Green Ghana Day was introduced as part of a national afforestation and reforestation programme to restore the lost forest cover of Ghana and to contribute to the global effort to mitigate climate change.