The Forestry Commission is pushing for the passage of the new Wildlife Resources Management Bill, 2021 into law after its approval by Cabinet.
The Bill seeks to revise and consolidate all laws relating to wildlife and protected areas, and bring the new legislation in conformity with existing policies in the sector.
It will also ensure the implementation of international conventions on wildlife, of which Ghana is a signatory.
The Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Commission, John Allotey said the bill among other things will create huge job opportunities for Ghana’s teeming unemployed youth.
“People are writing to the Forestry Commission that they want to establish ranches and other things. For all these things, we need to have a legislation to support it. This bill will make it possible. There is also a huge opportunity for the unemployed, energetic youth in terms of what we call captive breeding. We export a lot of animals legally, and we need to breed these animals. The wildlife division has the capacity to do this,” he stressed.
Mr. Allotey further indicated that the commission has made progress in fighting the phenomenon of illegal logging with new electronic systems meant to track harvested woods.
“We’ve been able to improve our processes, including training staff on the Ghana Wood Tracking System where you can tell where a tree was and when it was fell and trace it to the export consignment, so it is easy to deal with the illegalities.”
The national wood tracking system (WTS) is a sub-component of the Ghana Timber Legality Assurance System.
The tracking system is to ensure that timber entering the supply chain originates from legal sources and that timber flows are controlled throughout the whole supply chain.
The WTS mechanism is designed to monitor and track compliance of operators along the chain of custody of timber from the forest gate to the point of export or on the domestic market.
The Ghana Wood Tracking System(GhLAS) is predominantly electronic in character.
However, in extreme situations when the electronic system fails, it will be augmented with a paper-based mechanism as a backup.