Afforestation on Cocoa Farms is Ghana's Answer to Carbon Emissions
Ghana has over the years witnessed huge forest loss, mainly as a result of the movements of the timber sector as well as expansion of the cocoa industry, which largely promotes zero shade cocoa production systems. This gradually has led to the shattering of the country’s forest landscapes, loss of wildlife corridors, and degradation of biodiversity and ecosystem services. The expansion of the cocoa industry which eventually leads to forest loss is not driven by the desire to increase national production, but essentially challenge of land tenure system farmers face. Therefore, land tenure is an ongoing problem which enables forest loss through the removal of forests to establish cocoa farms. Ghana’s land tenure policy drives the lack of on-farm investment generally. This prevents the expansion of cocoa farms via more environmentally sound production using greater shade. Consequently, there is limited incentive for farmers to plant or even maintain shade trees due to tenure issues associated with landowners, and landowners have limited rights to naturally occurring trees on their land. Awareness creation on tree tenure rights is also lacking.
Rajesh Pamnani