Ghanaian Culture's Impact on Forest Sustainability: Traditions, Practices, Attitudes | Papers Environmental Science

Question: How do attitudes, traditions and practices embedded in Ghanaian culture

affect tree cutting within the country? What economic incentives encourage these

practices? And how can forest resources be sustained? [Good questions]

In many regions of Ghana, trees are cut and forests are cleared to make way for

and to facilitate the needs of man. This has been the practice for many generations and it

has been encouraged by certain ideas and traditions embedded in Ghanaian culture. The

practice has also been directly encouraged by the socio-economic situation in Ghana.

Excessive forest clearing is however detrimental to the environment and has deleterious

effects on many scales and across many generations. Thus, there is the need for efforts

geared towards the sustainability of our forests. Sustainability is defined as meeting our

current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs

(UN, 1987) [fine, but how do you specifically define it with respect to forest practices in

Ghana?]. There is a need to change our ideology about nature and our practices if we are

to achieve sustainability in the use of our forests. This, however, is a tall order as there

are many impediments to efforts aimed at achieving sustainability. However,

sustainability can be and must be achieved in Ghana. In the following paragraphs, I will

describe the problem of deforestation in Ghana, the motives behind it, and the social traps

that facilitate it. I will also discuss the socio-economic incentives that could be employed

to halt or at the very least, slow down this process. [Nice introduction]

The main source of energy for Ghanaian families is wood. For as long as anyone

can remember, Ghanaians have used wood and wood products in satisfying their daily

needs. Firewood and charcoal are used as fuel for cooking. The Ghanaian has come to

value wood only in this sense. As a means of cooking her food and if need be, building

her houses and furniture. At a very tender age, children are sent off into bushes and

groves to look for firewood and to cut trees for charcoal. These children thus develop the

notion that trees are to be tamed[why tamed? From your description it sounds like this is

not about taming, but about acquiring fuel.] and processed for their use. Embedded in this

idea about trees is the tradition of male dominance of the female gender. In Ghanaian

culture, females are seen as subservient to men and are to be seen but not heard. The

Ghanaian man has the ultimate authority in a household. Thus anything such as nature

that has feminine qualities is exploited for the benefit of man [you need to explain a bit

more about how this concept of male dominance is related to wood gathering – this is not

clear here]. The Akan, an ethnic group call the earth Asaase Yaa, Yaa being the name of

a woman born on a Thursday. Nature is as such equated with women and is very much

exploited. As Vandana Shiva (1994) says, “nature and women are turned into passive

objects to be used and exploited for the uncontrolled and uncontrollable desires of

alienated man”. Men go out into forests to cut trees that are then carried home on the

heads of women and children.

Also, there are economic incentives that tie in with these traditions and patriarchal

practices. The average Ghanaian lives on a daily wage of less than one dollar. The

income of a man is therefore not enough to satisfy the feeding and clothing needs of his

family much less[?] his energy needs. If a man must buy his food, there must be a way to

reduce the cost of processing it for consumption. Firewood and charcoal are by far the

cheapest sources of fuel use in Ghana. Other forms of energy such as Liquefied

Petroleum Gas and electricity are economically expensive relative to fuel wood. Besides,

they require very sophisticated gadgets to convert their intrinsic energy into heat, gadgets

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Question: How do attitudes, traditions and practices embedded in Ghanaian culture affect tree cutting within the country? What economic incentives encourage these practices? And how can forest resources be sustained? [Good questions] In many regions of Ghana, trees are cut and forests are cleared to make way for and to facilitate the needs of man. This has been the practice for many generations and it has been encouraged by certain ideas and traditions embedded in Ghanaian culture. The practice has also been directly encouraged by the socio-economic situation in Ghana. Excessive forest clearing is however detrimental to the environment and has deleterious effects on many scales and across many generations. Thus, there is the need for efforts geared towards the sustainability of our forests. Sustainability is defined as meeting our current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs (UN, 1987) [fine, but how do you specifically define it with respect to forest practices in Ghana?]. There is a need to change our ideology about nature and our practices if we are to achieve sustainability in the use of our forests. This, however, is a tall order as there are many impediments to efforts aimed at achieving sustainability. However, sustainability can be and must be achieved in Ghana. In the following paragraphs, I will describe the problem of deforestation in Ghana, the motives behind it, and the social traps that facilitate it. I will also discuss the socio-economic incentives that could be employed to halt or at the very least, slow down this process. [Nice introduction] The main source of energy for Ghanaian families is wood. For as long as anyone can remember, Ghanaians have used wood and wood products in satisfying their daily needs. Firewood and charcoal are used as fuel for cooking. The Ghanaian has come to value wood only in this sense. As a means of cooking her food and if need be, building her houses and furniture. At a very tender age, children are sent off into bushes and groves to look for firewood and to cut trees for charcoal. These children thus develop the notion that trees are to be tamed[why tamed? From your description it sounds like this is not about taming, but about acquiring fuel.] and processed for their use. Embedded in this idea about trees is the tradition of male dominance of the female gender. In Ghanaian culture, females are seen as subservient to men and are to be seen but not heard. The Ghanaian man has the ultimate authority in a household. Thus anything such as nature that has feminine qualities is exploited for the benefit of man [you need to explain a bit more about how this concept of male dominance is related to wood gathering – this is not clear here]. The Akan, an ethnic group call the earth Asaase Yaa, Yaa being the name of a woman born on a Thursday. Nature is as such equated with women and is very much exploited. As Vandana Shiva (1994) says, “nature and women are turned into passive objects to be used and exploited for the uncontrolled and uncontrollable desires of alienated man”. Men go out into forests to cut trees that are then carried home on the heads of women and children. Also, there are economic incentives that tie in with these traditions and patriarchal practices. The average Ghanaian lives on a daily wage of less than one dollar. The income of a man is therefore not enough to satisfy the feeding and clothing needs of his family much less[?] his energy needs. If a man must buy his food, there must be a way to reduce the cost of processing it for consumption. Firewood and charcoal are by far the cheapest sources of fuel use in Ghana. Other forms of energy such as Liquefied Petroleum Gas and electricity are economically expensive relative to fuel wood. Besides, they require very sophisticated gadgets to convert their intrinsic energy into heat, gadgets

that can not be afforded by the average working man. The fact that the greater percentage of Ghanaians live in the lower income bracket does not help the situation. Furthermore, this high demand for fuel wood creates a positive feedback effect on the felling of trees. As more fuel wood is demanded, there is a greater incentive for people to fell more trees and to meet the demand as that would improve their economic well being with the only inputs of production being the human energy employed to fell these trees thus creating large profit margins. As suppliers of fuel wood earn abnormal profits there is the incentive for other unemployed Ghanaians to enter the market. More trees are felled and since the detrimental effects are not felt immediately, there is a social trap and a tragedy of the commons with more forests cleared and each individual ignorant of the effect he has on the environment. Constanza (1987) defines the tragedy of the commons as “…a collective trap that occurs because the costs and benefits apparent to the individual are inconsistent with the costs and benefits to the collective society”. Any additional individual that cuts one more tree for firewood sees himself not destroying the microclimate but making additional income for his livelihood. The glut in supply of fuel wood results in an artificial decline in the price of fuel wood making it cheaper still thus increasing demand for it. Both the supplier and demander have only their benefits in mind [? Not clear what you are arguing here] and not the cost to society. They in most cases are even ignorant of them. Another practice that has inherent economic incentives and results in the destruction of forests is farming especially in cash crops such as cocoa. Large acres of virgin forests are cleared every year to make way for new farmlands. Farmers feel the ever increasing need to expand their farms to take advantage of increasing prices of cocoa on the world market and to compensate for decreases in prices [This sentence seems contradictory – the incentive is to increase both if prices go up and if they go down? Explain]. Even though there seems to be a tragedy of the commons evident here, with everyone looking out for himself, the greater picture shows that this is facilitated by popular demand by the public and by government subsidies to farmers. Ghana is the second leading exporter of cocoa in the world. The economy is so dependent on how well cocoa does on the market that the slightest drop in the price of cocoa reflects in an economic downturn. The politicians who want to get re-elected and the Ghanaian citizenry which aspires to a “higher standard” of living have the same solution; increase the production of cocoa. But are the costs of deforestation worth the benefits? The simple answer is no. In fact, they outweigh the benefits. On the local stage, forests create a very delicate balance for the survival of the ecosystem. Especially, in Ghana’s tropical rainforests which are being cleared for cocoa, are evergreen trees that collect a lot of moisture all year round and thus create a microclimate for both their use and the use of other plant species in the locale. These plants make the environment suitable for the survival of species that in a lot of cases are endemic to these forests. The plants provide shelter, food and protection to many animals and other plants. These in turn die and decay into manure to fertilize the soil and provide the plant with nutrients. These chains are those referred to by Foster and Magdoff (1998) when they wrote about the cycling of nutrients and as in that case the fertility of the land decreased with over cropping and the removal of animals from the land so would the removal of forests decrease the fertility of the land. These infertile soils would be left for generations upon generations of future offspring to use. This does not fit

practices of the Ghanaian people and has economic basis however mean that forests cannot be sustained in Ghana? The answer is no. The means to accomplishing such an end is, however, very tricky. There must be an effort to change the traditions and practices that link nature to women and thus oppress nature just as they oppress women. However, entirely decoupling nature from women is not the right approach as this would be met with a lot of skepticism as any culture will react aggressively to ideologies intended to do away with certain “values”. Instead, the effort to prevent deforestation could be linked to the increasing movement for the recognition of the rights of women [yes, this seems like a better approach – why assume that delinking nature and women would necessarily improve treatment of nature]. This method of approach would argue that as much as women need to be given equal rights, nature and thus forests must also be valued and conserved and not indiscriminately abused [good]. This is in line with Vandana Shiva’s (1994) suggestion that “…the recovery of the feminine principle is simultaneously a feminine and ecological process which legitimizes the way of knowing and being that create life and diversity and delegitimizes the knowledge and practice of death as the basis of capital accumulation’. This is not to say however that forests are of the same value to men as women are but that nature has value of its own that is independent of any value it acquires by its usefulness to man and that man is just a plain member and citizen of the land community and not a conqueror (Leopold, 1966). As the fight for women’srights wins more victories then, the fight for a sustainable forest community in Ghana would also be gaining ground[awkward sentence]. Another way to go about preventing deforestation is to link efforts aimed at preventing deforestation to the traditions and culture of Ghanaian ethnic groups. In all the ethnic groups and in my hometown Aholikope, there are sacred groves which are thickets of forests that are dedicated to the gods of the land. No wood is cut from these thickets and the dangers of contravening these rules are imbibed into young and old alike. These sacred groves inevitably came about by the realization of our ancestors that forests had to be conserved. The people of these groups revere the gods of the land and therefore abide by every rule that is said to be from the gods. There could be a countrywide drive to encourage the establishment of more sacred groves [This raises interesting questions about whether spirituality can be mandated. Who would designate these as sacred? Would all of the different cultures recognize these as sacred?. This would increase the amount of conserved forests available while decreasing the acreage of forests available for logging by the people. This in itself however, is not an efficient way of conserving forests as it can only go as far. Only a minimal percentage of the forests in Ghana can be turned into sacred groves and as Constanza (1987) notes, it requires a relatively homogenous society of likeminded people for religion to be really effective [yes, good]. There must be an infusion of massive short run educational campaigns to make people aware of the effects of clearing the vegetation and a long run educational strategy to increase the rate of literacy of the population. The short run education can take the mode of screening of documentaries that depict the havocs wreaked by deforestation and of means of conserving forests [is this a sufficient mechanism given the economic feedback that you discussed?]. Even though Constanza (1987) is skeptical of this approach due to the fact that it depends on whether the individual decides to change his ways or ignore the warnings, he agrees that it could be effective. There could be catch

phrases such as “a tree for each one cut” to encourage the reforestation. The long run approach would however require political will as it would require the government to put in place mechanisms and policies that would increase the overall enrolment and retention rates of students, at least at the basic levels of education. These policies could involve the provision of free basic education and legislative instruments that make the attainment of this level of education compulsory. It must also involve the incorporation of environmental studies into the curriculum. There must be an improvement in the quality of education provided and the human capital that is produced by this system of education. This would raise the technical aptitude of the economy and ensure that the economy moves from being overly dependent on agriculture and the cultivation of cash crops such as cocoa to being a manufacturing economy and a net exporter of human capital [not clear exactly what you mean here – emigration???]. The government must then create incentives for people cutting trees to stop or at least minimize the number of trees they cut and for those consuming tree products to minimize their demand. This can be done by extending the electric grid to rural areas and subsidizing the costs of its usage and that of alternative(green) forms of energy so that demand for fuel wood would decrease thereby forcing supply to adjust and decreasing the rate at which vegetation is cleared. The government can also subsidize firms that produce relatively cheap equipment which use these environmentally friendly fuel sources. The government could then put in place laws that limit the acreage of trees that can be cut and ensure that a tree or two is planted for each one cut. Achieving this involves a great deal of cost to the government [Indeed]. The ultimate way to prevent excessive cutting and use of tree and tree products is by converting the social traps into tradeoffs. “A trap may be changed into a tradeoff by imposing compensatory fees” (Constanza, 1987). The government could employ its inherent right to tax any good it deems fit. Thus, the government could, for instance, impose taxes on fuel wood and charcoal. These taxes would make it less economically viable to sell these products as the costs involved in transporting them to market centers would outweigh the reward. However, this would have to be a gradually phased process that would span several years to lessen the detrimental effects on human well being and standards of living. It would also have to be implemented hand in hand with policies that increase the fraction of the population that has employable skills and would create jobs to cater for this flux of labor. It is thus reasonable to say sustainability of forests in Ghana can be achieved but only through the necessary political will, the use of existing traditions to reinforce environmental principles, the overall education of the masses and the conversion of social traps into tradeoffs. References cited: Costanza, R. 1987. Social traps and environmental policy. In BioScience 37: 407-412. Foster, J.B. and F. Magdoff. 1998. Liebig, Marx, and the depletion of soil fertility: relevance for today's agriculture. In Monthly Review 50: 32-45. Leopold, A. 1966. The land ethic. In A sand county almanac with other essays on conservation from round river: 103-123. Lovins, A.E. 1999. How not to parachute more cats: 100-117. Miller, G.T. 1999. Sustaining the earth: an integrated approach: 18-74.

Ghanaian Culture's Impact on Forest Sustainability: Traditions, Practices, Attitudes, Papers of Environmental Science

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