The Wiki-Green Conference 2023 has been held in Accra and Tamale to train participants on contributing to environmental-related articles on Wikipedia and its sister projects.
The first event organized in Accra from 19th – 20th May 2023 represented the southern part of Ghana. This session was facilitated by Dr Antwi-Bosiako Amoah, Director of Vulnerability Assessment at the Environmental Protection Agency of Ghana.
This was further led by Stephen Dakyi, a Co-founder of the Wiki Green Initiative and Jesse of Wiki Podcast fame which focused on training and a live-edit session.
Delivering the keynote address in Tamale edition that spanned from 9th – 10th June, 2023, Dr Kodimah Siita, emphasized the need for Ghanaian youth to become agents of change in the fight against climate change.
He further urged the participants to use their knowledge and skills to create and edit Wikipedia articles on environmental topics, such as climate change, pollution, and sustainable development.
A co-founder of the Ghanaian Pidgin Wikimedia Community, Maxwell Beganim, explained that the conference provided hands-on training in editing and contributing to Wikipedia.
He also said that the conference focused on the loss and damage resulting from climate change, and how Wikimedia projects can be used to communicate about these issues.
Fuseini Mohammed Kamal-Deen, a co-founder of the Gurene Wikimedia Community, shared insights on OpenStreetMap (OSM), a free and open-source geographic information system and showed how OSM can be used to map communities and demonstrate the power of geospatial data for environmental initiatives.
The conference hosted participants from various indigenous language Wikipedia communities in Ghana, such as Gurene, Dagbani, Kusaal, Twi, Fante, Ga, Ewe, Moore, and others. It was an opportunity for participants to learn from each other and share their knowledge and experiences.
The flagship program of the Wiki Green Initiative is the Wiki Green Conference, which has become an annual event that provides a platform for discourse on the detrimental effects of climate change and pollution on the rights and freedoms of Ghanaians.
There are other programs of the Initiative like the Campus Green Communities (CCC) and Wiki4Climate
