AYUM MAKES STRIDES IN FOREST RESOURCES PROTECTION (PAGE 36)

IN September, 2001, President J.A. Kufuor launched his special initiative (PSI) on forest plantations, realising the significance of forest resources in the lives of mankind. The launch took place at Ayigbe, a predominantly farming community along the Sunyani-Techiman road.
After launchig the programme, the President went ahead to put in place the Forest Plantation Fund Development Board (FPFDB) under the chairmanship of the Okyenhene, Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin II, to manage and oversee the programme of reforestation in the country.
Since its establishment in 2002, the FPFDB has been presenting nursery tools to a number of communities to plant in the degraded forests. On July 31, 2008, the Okyenhene made one of such presentations to six selected communities in the Brong Ahafo Region.
The items, valued at GH¢18,000, included wire mesh, wheelbarrows, shovels, machetes, hoes, watering cans, head pans, buckets, wellington boots and rakes. The beneficiary communities were Kwadaso, Subriso, Buoku, Konasua and Twumasikrom as well as Wamanafo Mixed Stand Plantation Group.
The communities were the first to receive the tools because they had been able to reforest the largest portions of degraded forests in their respective communities since the president launched the special initiative.
At the presentation ceremony in Sunyani, the Okyenhene noted that there was the urgent need to protect the country’s forest resources because the sub-sector constituted six per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and employed 120,000 people in the formal sector while the forestry sector also directly supported the livelihood of about two million Ghanaians.
Osagyefo Ofori Panin also observed with concern that Ghana was threatened by the rapid depletion of its forest resources, leading to a reduction in the productive capacity of the forest.
He stressed that the annual timber harvest was almost four times the annual allowable cut, resulting in an estimated annual forest resource depletion cost of between four and six per cent of GDP.
According to him, the board had so far disbursed GH¢6 million to support the plantation development programme, and that funds provided by the board to the Forestry Commission had been used to cultivate 53,000 hectares of Taungya Plantations.
Osagyefo Ofori Panin said the board had also supported more than 1,000 individuals and 60 communities to plant tress on farmlands with tree seedlings, including fruit trees, which had also been supplied to schools, district and municipal assemblies and other public sector organisations.
Responding positively to the PSI on forest plantations, Ayum Forest Products (Mim) Limited, a timber company operating in the Asunafo North Municipality in the Brong Ahafo Region, has embarked on a massive reforestation project in its degraded Amama Forest Reserve at Atronie, near Sunyani.
It was established in 1940 as a Shelter belt Reserve (battery of blocks of forest oriented in the north-south direction across the path of the harmatan wind to help reduce the effect of the dry winds).
The reserve covers an area of 44 square kilometres and ecologically, the reserve forms part of the north-western block of the moist semi-deciduous forest zone in Ghana and was noted for a high density of important tropical hard wood timber species, including Afromosia and Sapele. Over 100 tree species were identified in the forest around 1964.
In terms of biodiversity conservation, it formed a corridor between the Bosomkese Reserve to the east and Asukese to the west and before 1983, facilitated the seasonal movement of elephants in the then designated Bosomkese group, according to officials of the company.
According to the Ayum Reforestation Manager, Mr Michael Gyasi Mensah, from 1983 to the early 1990’s, fire was regularly sweeping through the forest, which had before then been one of the richest government forest reserves in the country.
In 2001, when the concession was divested from the Mim Timber Company (MTC), which was government owned to Ayum, the forest had been seriously degraded and since then not a single tree had been logged because a greater proportion of the reserved area had no merchantable trees.
The only areas with any appreciable amount of tree cover occurred along the banks of the streams joining the rivers. Since the river banks fall under the fine grain protection areas as defined by the forest protection strategy of Ghana, those areas could not be logged.
It is against this background that, the company decided to go into massive reforestation programme to meet the company’s obligations under the Trades Union Congress (TUC) agreement through enhancement of the economic and environmental value of the land area constituted as Amama Forest Reserve.
Since 2002, when the company started its project on a trial basis with only 50 hectares containing 31,609 tree species, Ayum has now planted a total of 4,508,397 species, covering grand total land area of 43 square kilometres. The tree species include Cedrella, Ofram, Ceiba, Mahogany, Edinam, Wawa, Utile, Emire, Kyenkyen, Koto, Kokrodua, Mansonia, Asanfina, Makore and Akasa, as well as some exotic species.
According to the Forest Operations Co-ordinator of the company, Mr Hani Kweku Ibrahim Captan, with an initial amount of $200,000, the company had now injected about $1 million into the plantation.
He expressed the hope that “Within the next 15 to 20 years, we shall reap some benefits. We are doing it in all our concessions in the country to sustain the future of our industry”.
On August 15, 2008, the Okyenhene, accompanied by 30 small-scale plantation developers in the Brong Ahafo Region, visited the plantation site at Atronie. The trip was initiated by Ms Gytha A. Nuno, the Executive Director of Environ-Care Wagon, an environmental education organisation and an immediate past member of the Forestry Commission Board.
The aim of the visit was to showcase the company’s plantation as a model site for field training of local community and small scale forest plantation developers and to whet their appetite for more “natural” plantations.
For almost three hours, the visitors were conducted round the plantation by the Reforestation Manager, Mr Mensah and Lt Col K.A. Odoi-Gyampo, the Administrative Manager of Ayum.
Surprisingly, the board chairman did not show any sign of weary and defied the muddy lanes in the plantation and rather walked through energetically.
In a brief speech, the Reforestation Manager stated that there were 105 permanent workers at the site and 15 temporary ones.
He said the fringe communities were invited to plant food crops on plots allocated to them, to boost food supply in the region in particular and the country as a whole.
According to him, there were about 400 farmers located in various portions of the land area, who were engaged in cassava, plantain, yams and other food crops production.
The company, he said, had indeed created jobs for people in the community.
Lt Col Odoi-Gyampo explained that in going about their activities, the farmers take good care of the tree seedlings planted by the company’s workers.
He stated that the company had no share of the foodstuffs produced by the farmers, adding that the agro-forestry system had greatly helped the two parties.
The reforestation manager noted with satisfaction that since 2002, no fire outbreak had been recorded on the plantation.
He stressed that the farmers had been banned from taking matches, lighters and any other form of live fire to the plantation for cooking purposes or smoking, a directive, he said, had worked very well.
Osagyefo Ofori Panin, who was overwhelmed by the operations of the company, remarked that, “Ayum is doing a wonderful job here and if all timber firms, groups and individuals were to do the same thing, there would have been a tremendous resuscitation of all degraded forests in the country”.
“I am not driven here in my capacity as a traditional ruler but I am here by my passion for nature, and it is sad that our forests have been destroyed through human activities, but we need to respect the rule of nature, since it is difficult to bring back what we destroy,” he said.