Celebrated Ghanaian musician Okyeame Kwame (Kwame Nsiah-Apau) has been announced by the Dedicated Grant Mechanism (DGM) Ghana project as ambassador for their climate change campaign. The unveiling ceremony came off at the premises of Solidaridad (East Legon) on Wednesday January 24, 2018.
The rapper’s role in this new undertaking over the next 300 days, according to Solidaridad’s Regional Director, Isaac Gyamfi, will be to “help drum home the impact of climate change and hopefully move the public to take responsible action to fight the global phenomenon.
Widely regarded a positive influencer in Ghana’s creative space and beyond, Okyeame Kwame, who has frequently been associated with developmental endeavours as this, lamented how rapidly the environment is being destroyed at our hands, especially when it comes to our forests. This, he observes, could lead to a reduction in farmers’ yields, proving a huge obstacle to our fight against poverty. He also submitted that our ultimate tasks as humans, is to serve others, something which motivated his decision t one part of the war against the effects of climate change via the DGM Ghana project.
“I believe that if you can put the interest of other people first, that is when you are living the life that God wants you to live. I strongly believe that for us to develop as a people everybody must use their positive attitude, instincts, abilities, talents for the society to grow,” he stated.
Both Hayford Duodu (Chairman of DGM Ghana’s National Steering Committee), and Suzan Yemidi (Country Representative of Solidaridad Ghana), expressed confidence in Okyeame Kwame to help make significant strides in the climate change fight, capitalising on his popularity and clout to improve awareness in local communities regarding the repercussions of the troubling phenomenon.
The Ghana Dedicated Grant Mechanism project seeks to make a significant contribution toward the fight against forest loss and unsustainable land use practices that drive climate change and associated impacts, by putting local communities at the forefront.
The project’s objective is to strengthen knowledge and practices of targeted local communities in the Western and Brong Ahafo Regions in REDD+ processes and sustainable forest management.
The project seeks to achieve this through capacity building in REDD+, climate change, and the provision of demand-driven grants to 52 local communities and community organizations in the Brong Ahafo and Western Regions.
The Climate Investment Fund and the World Bank are key partners of the DGM project, implemented by Solidaridad under the oversight of community representatives, who constitute the National Steering Committee.