Wa-Ghana, Nov. 24, GNA – Integrating both social transformation and resilience building is essential for effective tackling of the complex and interconnected climate change issues, Madam Rita Mumuni, Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, Programme Coordination Unit of the European Union Ghana Agriculture Programme (EUGAP), has said.
She explained that social transformation for climate resilience involved reshaping social norms, behaviours, and structures to address environmental challenges, including fostering sustainable practices, promoting ecofriendly policies and encouraging community collaboration.
Madam Mumuni was speaking at a day’s knowledge sharing and validation workshop organized by the European Union funded Resilience Against Climate Change – Social Transformation Research and Policy Advocacy (EU-funded REACH-STR) Project in Wa.
The EU-funded REACH-STR project is being led by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in partnership with the Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies (SDD-UBIDS), University of Ghana-Centre for Migration Studies (UG-CMS), and the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Science and Technology Policy Research Institute (CSIR-STEPRI).
The EUGAP Monitoring and Evaluation Officer noted that the platform provided REACH-STR project to share insights from the research conducted and for stakeholders to deliberate on how social transformation research and analysis could be integrated into climate resilience interventions to ensure positive transformative outcomes.
The event, which was under the topic, “Social transformation and climate resilience building: Lessons from 3 case studies”, brought together stakeholders, including Development Partners, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), Academia, Ministries, Departments and Agencies, as well as community members.
“Building climate resilience within communities involves enhancing adaptive capacities, creating infrastructure, and ensuring equitable access to resources”, she said and commended REACH-STR for the work done in this area.
Dr. Charity Osei-Amponsah, Senior Regional Researcher and Project Coordinator (REACH-STR), IWMI, explained that the EU-funded REACH-STR project conducted case studies on three developmental interventions, specifically, Kulung Bridge in the Wa East District, Market-Oriented Agricultural Programme (MOAP) in Chapuri in the Jirapa Municipality, and Resilience Against Climate Change’s Conservation Agriculture (CA) practices in Janguasi in the Nadowli-Kaleo District.
She noted that the workshop aimed to share the key insights from the research and deliberate with stakeholders on how social transformation analysis could be integrated into climate resilience interventions to ensure positive transformative outcomes.
Dr Osei-Ampomah added that the workshop would also offer relevant stakeholders the opportunity to validate the findings of the research and fill gaps in the evidence and its interpretation.
Dr William Quarmine, a Researcher at the IWMI, on why the REACH-STR project, noted that North-West Ghana faced climate change challenges, which made the region vulnerable.
This crisis context, he said, was also changing rapidly and therefore presents complex socio-cultural, technological, demographic, political, economic challenges and opportunities for policy makers and development planning processes.
Dr Quarmine said the objectives of the project was to investigate social transformation conditions that promoted sustainable and inclusive rural development, and adoption of climate change adaptation and mitigation practices and also contribute to a better understanding of social transformation by district, regional and national decision makers.
Again, it would support integration and application of social transformation analysis in development planning and implementation.
Mr Douri Bennin Hajei, the Executive Director, Youth Advocacy on Rights and Opportunities (YARO) and a participant at the knowledge sharing and validation workshop stated that the REACH-STR agenda was on course as more women were now getting space to engage in smallholder farming using the best conservation agriculture practices as well as opened up markets to the farm gates.
He encouraged communities to own the lessons and practices presented by the project to ensure sustainability and future expansion to cover other districts that were not presently covered.
Meanwhile, the survey established that the construction of the Kuluung Bridge had eased movement of people and carting farm produce and also created new socioeconomic opportunities for the people to undertake livelihoods.
The MOAP model on the other hand enabled farmers to have access to inputs and gained new knowledge in farming practices and also contributed to higher output and a ready market for the produce according to the survey.
Also, conservation agriculture practices such as agroforestry, minimal tillage, ripping, and intercropping were exposed to farmers and the adoption of these practices according to the survey resulted in women’s access to land, and improved crop yield.
