Ghana puts green economy concept into national development
Ms Sherry Ayittey, Ghana’s Minister of Environment, Science and Technology, on Thursday said government has mainstreamed the concept of green economy into national development as an important tool for pursuing the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
She said therefore the ministry seeks to infuse the outcomes of the United Nations Conference for Sustainable Development (RIO+20) as early as possible into the national development agenda.
She said the Rio+20 affirms the green economy as having different approaches, visions, models and tools available to each country to achieve sustainable development.
Ms Ayittey made this observation at the briefing session on the Rio+20 conference outcomes for Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA’s), Development Partners and the Media in Accra.
The briefing was to apprise policymakers and development partners of the key Rio+20 outcomes and the implications on Ghana, to mobilize political support for needed follow-up actions and to launch the stakeholder discussions on the green economy.
Ms Ayittey said the conference which took place in Brazil addressed the green economy in the context of sustainable development, poverty reduction, and institutional framework for sustainable development along with other wider development objectives.
She noted that the move to consider a new development agenda had become more imperative because of the fast approach of the expiry date for achieving the MDG’s which sets target to be met by 2015.
“While the global development parameters were being set by the United Nations, our new national development agenda should seek to identify the nature of the development framework and action plans that should be established as a follow-up to the MDG’s after 2015,” she stated.
Ms Ayittey stated that, the Rio+20 conference also came out with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which would be further examined by countries in national context and in relation to the expiry of the MDG’s and especially in the light of its unlikely attainment by the deadlines.
She said the challenge faced by the world today, require a new partnership for development that includes the full range of actors and flexible forms of partnership at all levels and called on development partners to reshape partnerships to avoid the perception of “a donor-recipient relationship.
She urged all MDA’s and development partners to work in concert to develop a road map for taking into account the feasibility of using the green economy as a tool for sustainable development to continuously keep the environment in focus.
Ms Ruby Sandhu-Rojon, United Nations Resident Coordinator, said for growth to be sustained, it must be done equally, saying, in our pursuit for economic growth, equal attention must be paid to social equity and environmental pillars.
She said the outcome of the Rio+20 was an affirmation of the centrality of sustainable development, and for Ghana, this was particularly relevant as it grapples with increasing inequality amidst economic growth.
Ms Sandhu-Rojon urged all participants to launch a swift and well-coordinated implementation of follow-up actions at the national level, adding that the UN would continue to work closely with government, civil society and other development partners to mobilize what was required to attain sustainable development in Ghana.
Source: GNA