By Doreen Hammond
An announcement on the radio some time ago invited patrons to join a restaurant in celebrating its golden jubilee. This tiny eatery is around the Kwame Nkrumah Circle. Then I asked myself, “What is there to celebrate for a restaurant that started in a store room and has remained there for 50 years, with a work force of less than ten”? I would not be surprised if the menu has remained the same over the years in operation.
The above scenario and similar happenings bring to the fore the issue of the Ghanaian’s ability to make it as a businessman or businesswoman. Stories abound in how some of the wealthiest people in the world had to struggle from scratch to create their wealth. Of course, including some Ghanaians. But it seems that gradually, this class of entrepreneurs are getting fewer by the day in Ghana.
Take the case of the average Lebanese. He arrives in Ghana or any part of Africa usually without capital and is also disadvantaged by culture and even language. He assists a compatriot in his shop for about a year or two. With the help of the Lebanese community, he sets up his own shop and in a couple of years he is one of the most successful business men in town! Is the Lebanese culture of family networks that mentor the upstart who will not squander the money due to the family honouring the secret? Or what else could it be?
Let’s take the example of the fast food franchise, Papaye, which arrived in the country to meet so many local restaurants but left all of them behind. Today, they have gone beyond Osu in Accra opening branches on the Spintex road, at Tesano in Accra, etc while most of the locally owned restaurants are still marking time!
Melcom is another success story, never mind what they are selling . Azar paint is, Latex foam, Polytank are all examples of such success stories. Palace Shopping mall started on the Spintex road and has expanded to another site with more variety of goods on the same Spintex road transforming where they started off into a Home Decor/ furniture city.
Why must every Ghanaian graduate seek employment with the state? Is the problem in our system of education which tends to train people for white colour jobs instead of hands on practical undertakings? Take a cursory look at the few so-called wealthy people around and you will realise that these are people who have been in government before or have cronies in power. Why can’t the average Ghanaian set up from scratch, come up with innovative ways of providing services that are needed so as to create wealth for himself? Must we always go into what somebody else has already started? So somebody starts a communications centre and in two years, everybody is towing the same line. The length and breadth of the country is inundated with communication centres. Then when that field gets saturated we all move to say car washing, then to pure water manufacturing, the running of taxis and tro-tro, roasting plantain and the setting up of hairdressing salons where in no time the workers don’t care if customers walk out very dissatisfied while they pay special attention to only a few favourites they call customers because of tips.
Recently the move has been into the music industry— on television we see many characters presenting themselves to us as musicians by taking a well-known old tune and miserably affixing their own lyrics to bother our ears and our eyes with their over-dependence on the sea and its shores for visuals to accompany videos! For them the name of Jesus in the song is bound to sell the song! Is that how to compose music? How many people buy those CDs? Little wonder they fizzle out in no time just like they came in. And must every rich man be a road or something contractor?
So why can’t the average Ghanaians pool resources and go into joint businesses as is done elsewhere? I think the answer may lie to a large extent in ego, greed and suspicion. Try this and as soon as the business starts to flourish, your partner is already thinking of how to do you in! Our desire to cheat and short change foreigners is legendary. There are stories of people giving brass and broken bottles as gold and diamonds to their foreign partners and in no time what could have matured into a prosperous business venture is nibbed in the bud. Foreigners have sealed business transactions on the Internet and landed in the country with moneys only to be duped!
Of course we cannot also forget our penchant for new wives when business makes some little gains. Some also use their capital to put up huge mansions and eventually collapse their businesses! The keeping of good business records is also a problem. So the businessman, manager, director / boss dips his hands into the business coffers without setting for himself his salaries and allowances and without knowing how much he last took and what is left!
Some businesses are tied so much to their founders that as soon as they die, the business goes with them. Swedru Contractors, Poku Transport , korsah Brothers and Sons and more recently Kasap are a few of such businesses.
The lack of trust culminating in our difficulty to access credit facilities also presents a big hurdle . This lack of trust has evolved from a culture of deception and greed. There is no training on how to build credit and most people will poorly manage what is given them on credit with no regard for tomorrow. You talk to Unique Trust and it becomes clear how people use fictitious documents to go for loans without the slightest hope of ever paying!
It is not all despair though as there are still great Ghanaian entrepreneurs that can hold their own against the best anytime anywhere. Names like the Sikkens, Asuma Bandas, Akoko Darkos, Sam Jonahs and Prince Kofi Amoabeng readily stick out. But the fact remains that the Lebanese, Syrians and the Indians are doing better in our own backyard . We must, therefore, look at where the problems are and begin to assert ourself especially in business endeavours which has to do with manufacturing in addition to our car-washing bays and hair-dressing saloons .
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Is our social welfare system failing us?
By Doreen Hammond
It has become a common practice to see mothers and their sick children or sometimes mothers themselves on television soliciting funds to undergo medical treatment. In a tearful tone, a mother narrates how she or her child has contracted some ailment and how they do not have the means to foot the cost of treatment and is therefore appealing to the public to come to their aid.
Some of them get the desired help and are able to get the treatment they require. For others, help comes too late. But the question is: Should we, as a society, accept a situation where we always have to parade the sick in the media (to the public) before they get the needed help?
A recent TV news revealed the dehumanising plight of a visually impaired woman who had made the Odawna Bridge home to her family of two equally visually impaired children. According to the story, the children were three but one could not be found. The whole family looked hungry and emaciated. It was after this exposure that the family got help.
One does not need to drive around our cities for long to encounter very pathetic scenes that carry poverty and exclusion to the high heavens. They also point in some way to the lack of fellow-feeling and the questions that come to mind are: Has our social welfare systems failed us? Where is our religious or cultural/traditional ethic of sharing? Does our extended family social protection work anymore? Is our traditional way of life, where people grow up in the family house and children don’t even know who their real mother is because they are taken care of by all the women in the family gone forever?
In Ghana, there are two ministries responsible for social welfare. There is the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare under which the Department of Social welfare is and the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs. In summary, their mission statements affirm among others, the social integration of the vulnerable, excluded and the disadvantaged for the development and growth of the economy. NGOs and some philanthropic individuals are also involved. Clearly, women and children, as well as the aged and the unskilled are easy victims of exclusion.
There are abundant stories of how children, once orphaned, become hungry and find themselves pushed onto the streets in search for food; with no homes, no shelter and no clothing, not to talk about education. Those who seem lucky to get to orphanages may not have totally escaped misery, for the hardship continues there, as if losing both parents is not enough trouble. The orphanages still depend on public donations to keeping running. Some of these orphanages are run by NGOs who use the children as mere numbers to solicit funds but these funds never get used for the purpose for which they are collected. Exploitation is the game. Stealing is the name! The results? Obvious— Poor nutrition, poor growth and a future with little hope for the children. According to Mr Stephen T. Adongo, Director of The Department of Social welfare,” There are about 5,000 NGOs on our register. Some just register and in less than a year, they fold up. We cannot even determine those who are active and those who are not.”
Most Ghanaians who are born physically challenged or become physically challenged through some incident or accident become vulnerable. The lack of physical abilities to do certain jobs exclude them from the mainstream job market and even if they do get jobs, they are poorly paid. By the mere presence of their challenge, they are unable to access most public places because provisions have not been made to facilitate their movement in most of such buildings. They are stigmatised and discriminated against.
On our streets are many people who have become beggars only because they are sick and cannot afford medical care. They are there with the unemployed who cannot maintain their families, and young, able bodied men and boys forcefully clean your windscreen in traffic with the hope of getting some money.
The issue of porters, better known as kayayei, has been overflogged. Most of them have migrated from the northern part of the country in search of jobs in the south. Their hopes are big but they find out too soon on arrival that living in insanitary conditions and a constant struggle for survival on the streets of Accra await them.
In spite of some interventions by Government and NGOs, the situation is not improving. For instance, there is an enforcement of Ghana’s 1998 Children’s Act requiring orphanages to present annual audited accounts. UNICEF is also assisting in drawing up new guidelines for orphanages.
The Department of Social Welfare has been intervening by taking some of the homeless and street children off the streets. There are also vocational training and skills-upgrade for artisans.
The Department of Social welfare also runs a system known as the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty(LEAP) Programme where cash is paid out to people under the poverty line.
Next week, the LEAP will pay 19,159 vulnerable people in 83 districts throughout the country a total of GH¢413,604.00
The amount is in respect of their remittances for the months of March and April this year.
According to Mr William Niyuni, Assistant Director in charge of Monitoring and Evaluation at the Department of Social Welfare, 15,746 people were paid a total of GH¢656,950.00 for November 2009 to February 2010.
The number of beneficiaries under the programme keeps changing because of reasons such as deaths, unavailability and inability of beneficiaries to collect monies as of the time of payment through Ghana Post.
Mr Adongo explains that the LEAP is one of the programmes put in place by Government to provide some relief to vulnerable people in the country.
Among those illegible are orphans, persons with severe disabilities who are untrainable and persons above age 65.
Even though not all such people are receiving help now, the department is to expand the programme to cover 55,000 households by December this year.
The Government has in place a policy to ensure Free Compulsory Basic Education for children, and it provides meals for some pupils in the School Feeding Programme and free school uniforms too.
But to what extent have these programmes been successful?
Mr Adongo was not happy that due to inadequate funds and inadequate staff strength, the department has become a “fire-fighting institution”; we know what to do but are unable to be proactive because of these reasons.”
“People will see a mentally ill person attacking someone on the street and that is when they take a phone and call and we rush to the scene to see what we can do to help, but should this be the situation?”, he asked.
It is an irony that the School of Social Work, run by the department, trains 45 people as social workers every year, but these workers cannot be employed by the department because there is no money to pay them. These social workers trained by the Government and with Government resources therefore find work in the private sector.
From what we see on our streets and in society and the challenges of the Department of Social Welfare, it is obvious that our social welfare system is failing us.
It appears that on paper we have what it takes to take care of the vulnerable in our society. We have the institution and the regulation but the reality of what we see on our streets speaks volumes.
We need a political commitment that will enable us make the care of the vulnerable in our society one of our priorities. Such a priority will culminate in an increase in our budget to provide the needed funds and employ the requisite staff to improve our social welfare system.
It is difficult to see how a society that does not take care of its vulnerable can make meaningful development.
Parading the sick in the public should not be a practice our society should be proud of.
It has become a common practice to see mothers and their sick children or sometimes mothers themselves on television soliciting funds to undergo medical treatment. In a tearful tone, a mother narrates how she or her child has contracted some ailment and how they do not have the means to foot the cost of treatment and is therefore appealing to the public to come to their aid.
Some of them get the desired help and are able to get the treatment they require. For others, help comes too late. But the question is: Should we, as a society, accept a situation where we always have to parade the sick in the media (to the public) before they get the needed help?
A recent TV news revealed the dehumanising plight of a visually impaired woman who had made the Odawna Bridge home to her family of two equally visually impaired children. According to the story, the children were three but one could not be found. The whole family looked hungry and emaciated. It was after this exposure that the family got help.
One does not need to drive around our cities for long to encounter very pathetic scenes that carry poverty and exclusion to the high heavens. They also point in some way to the lack of fellow-feeling and the questions that come to mind are: Has our social welfare systems failed us? Where is our religious or cultural/traditional ethic of sharing? Does our extended family social protection work anymore? Is our traditional way of life, where people grow up in the family house and children don’t even know who their real mother is because they are taken care of by all the women in the family gone forever?
In Ghana, there are two ministries responsible for social welfare. There is the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare under which the Department of Social welfare is and the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs. In summary, their mission statements affirm among others, the social integration of the vulnerable, excluded and the disadvantaged for the development and growth of the economy. NGOs and some philanthropic individuals are also involved. Clearly, women and children, as well as the aged and the unskilled are easy victims of exclusion.
There are abundant stories of how children, once orphaned, become hungry and find themselves pushed onto the streets in search for food; with no homes, no shelter and no clothing, not to talk about education. Those who seem lucky to get to orphanages may not have totally escaped misery, for the hardship continues there, as if losing both parents is not enough trouble. The orphanages still depend on public donations to keeping running. Some of these orphanages are run by NGOs who use the children as mere numbers to solicit funds but these funds never get used for the purpose for which they are collected. Exploitation is the game. Stealing is the name! The results? Obvious— Poor nutrition, poor growth and a future with little hope for the children. According to Mr Stephen T. Adongo, Director of The Department of Social welfare,” There are about 5,000 NGOs on our register. Some just register and in less than a year, they fold up. We cannot even determine those who are active and those who are not.”
Most Ghanaians who are born physically challenged or become physically challenged through some incident or accident become vulnerable. The lack of physical abilities to do certain jobs exclude them from the mainstream job market and even if they do get jobs, they are poorly paid. By the mere presence of their challenge, they are unable to access most public places because provisions have not been made to facilitate their movement in most of such buildings. They are stigmatised and discriminated against.
On our streets are many people who have become beggars only because they are sick and cannot afford medical care. They are there with the unemployed who cannot maintain their families, and young, able bodied men and boys forcefully clean your windscreen in traffic with the hope of getting some money.
The issue of porters, better known as kayayei, has been overflogged. Most of them have migrated from the northern part of the country in search of jobs in the south. Their hopes are big but they find out too soon on arrival that living in insanitary conditions and a constant struggle for survival on the streets of Accra await them.
In spite of some interventions by Government and NGOs, the situation is not improving. For instance, there is an enforcement of Ghana’s 1998 Children’s Act requiring orphanages to present annual audited accounts. UNICEF is also assisting in drawing up new guidelines for orphanages.
The Department of Social Welfare has been intervening by taking some of the homeless and street children off the streets. There are also vocational training and skills-upgrade for artisans.
The Department of Social welfare also runs a system known as the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty(LEAP) Programme where cash is paid out to people under the poverty line.
Next week, the LEAP will pay 19,159 vulnerable people in 83 districts throughout the country a total of GH¢413,604.00
The amount is in respect of their remittances for the months of March and April this year.
According to Mr William Niyuni, Assistant Director in charge of Monitoring and Evaluation at the Department of Social Welfare, 15,746 people were paid a total of GH¢656,950.00 for November 2009 to February 2010.
The number of beneficiaries under the programme keeps changing because of reasons such as deaths, unavailability and inability of beneficiaries to collect monies as of the time of payment through Ghana Post.
Mr Adongo explains that the LEAP is one of the programmes put in place by Government to provide some relief to vulnerable people in the country.
Among those illegible are orphans, persons with severe disabilities who are untrainable and persons above age 65.
Even though not all such people are receiving help now, the department is to expand the programme to cover 55,000 households by December this year.
The Government has in place a policy to ensure Free Compulsory Basic Education for children, and it provides meals for some pupils in the School Feeding Programme and free school uniforms too.
But to what extent have these programmes been successful?
Mr Adongo was not happy that due to inadequate funds and inadequate staff strength, the department has become a “fire-fighting institution”; we know what to do but are unable to be proactive because of these reasons.”
“People will see a mentally ill person attacking someone on the street and that is when they take a phone and call and we rush to the scene to see what we can do to help, but should this be the situation?”, he asked.
It is an irony that the School of Social Work, run by the department, trains 45 people as social workers every year, but these workers cannot be employed by the department because there is no money to pay them. These social workers trained by the Government and with Government resources therefore find work in the private sector.
From what we see on our streets and in society and the challenges of the Department of Social Welfare, it is obvious that our social welfare system is failing us.
It appears that on paper we have what it takes to take care of the vulnerable in our society. We have the institution and the regulation but the reality of what we see on our streets speaks volumes.
We need a political commitment that will enable us make the care of the vulnerable in our society one of our priorities. Such a priority will culminate in an increase in our budget to provide the needed funds and employ the requisite staff to improve our social welfare system.
It is difficult to see how a society that does not take care of its vulnerable can make meaningful development.
Parading the sick in the public should not be a practice our society should be proud of.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Television and the Internet— The enemy within?
By Doreen Hammond
At a ceremony at the Christ The King Church in Accra recently to confirm 140 baptised Catholics into the faith, the Archbishop of Accra, Most Reverend Charles Palmer-Buckle asked parents to be wary of the “new armed robbers” and carriers of immorality they had introduced into their homes.
He said that while parents had built high walls around their houses and further fenced them with electric barbed wire, the new robbers they should look out for were the television and Internet they left their children with all day without supervision.
He said that those technologies were the sites where children were picking up some of the unacceptable societal behaviours today.
Thanks to television, today busy parents are able to concentrate on their search for money and other business away from home knowing that they will not be missed very much by their own children. Gradually, consciously or unconsciously, the television and Internet has taken a central role in our lives.
Some studies have suggested that apart from sleeping, one other thing that occupies and takes the time of children most is television watching. Children are able to become so glued to the set that even when their parents call out their names, they do not hear, and have to be called so loudly several times. They are even able to forgo meals in favour of television and there is a continuous struggle among siblings in the home for possession of the remote control.
To resolve this problem many parents have acquired more than two sets for the home, sometimes it’s one for each room in the home! Children sit in front of the television with text and notebooks in hand pretending to study with one eye on the television and the other on the notes! How this works out beats imagination! But they go on flipping from channel to channel and are more able to tell where Rihanna’s next concert is to take place, how many times Tom was able to get even with Jerry and why Lil Wayne is heading for jail rather than be able to tell you why one plus one will not make three.
In her review on Children, Television and Gender Roles , Elena Beasly notes that children spend an average of 3.3 hours a day in front of the television every day. Van Evra, Judith (1990) in her study into Television and Child Development finds that Children do not simply absorb TV information, but actively process it and impose their own interpretations and expectations.
Even though the power of television and the Internet is not absolute because of some intervening variables, some teenagers who have neither been to the US nor had physical contact with some American musicians for instance, dress like 50 cent with bling , earrings and tattoos and the male teenagers walk all day with one hand holding on to their crotch, their trousers constantly falling off and words such as s**t and f**k you flowing without inhibition from their mouth in the name of fashion and “ to be seen as “G” by their mates ! Where else could they have picked these attributes?
Children flip from channel to channel absorbing stuff that may not be suitable for their formative age. How many times haven't we heard about children being involved in some freak accident as a result of imitating some action figures, Batman, Danger Mouse etc on television? Add the influx of all some Nigerian movies which don’t get shown in Nigeria but show freely on our sets and the picture becomes even bleaker!
Then again are the health effects of our newly acquired sedentary life styles. Some sit and watch television as they push loads of snacks like pop corn into their mouth. This is in contrast to how not too long ago we used to walk to school, to get water, climbed trees, sang and created our own play items such as toys and ran after lizards. Before the introduction of the television in the 1920s and the growth of the mass media, our influences on how to behave in society was acquired from the family, the community and school. The growth of the mass media has had a significant impact on the lives of everyone with the television and Internet becoming a very power medium. Thanks to television and the Internet, our active way of life has been reduced to the minimum. So today we have teenagers with pot bellies!
But it’s not all doom for the relationship between us, the Internet and television. Television viewing has its positives. Television and the Internet are great sources of information and learning which could help in the development of social roles and behaviour. TV entertainment programmes kill our boredom. We are able to improve our language through sheer information sharing on television and we are able to learn history just by clicking the button of the Internet. The two mediums carry us to places where we have never been keeping us abreast of happenings in other parts of the world and business trends.
We are able to seal business transactions via communication on the Internet. Therefore television and the Internet maintain their primary role of providing information, education and entertainment which are positives. Through discussion programmes we are able to share our ideas and views which is a prerequisite for the thriving of democracy. Our leaders are able to know what we want and what we are thinking.
But the concerns raised about what these powerful mediums are doing cannot also be glossed over. If only parents could be available to guide their children, but alas, where is the time?
Afua Yeboah , a mother of two has had to impose strict sanctions at home,— No television on week days— As to whether she is at home always to ensure that her directives are followed is another matter. Addiction to TV seems to have no simple remedy. Television and the Internet cannot take the place of parenting but that is exactly the way it seems now. Parents send their children off to watch TV when they think they are worrying them to much when all they want is some time with them and to get their questions answered.
How can we create a healthy balance between television and Internet use and other household and community activities for ourselves and our children? One of the ways to go is to make sure that content is child friendly.
The earlier we think this issue out the better, else , like The Most Rev Palmer –Buckle said, we will build higher walls with high voltage electric barb wire fences hemming in these new robbers and our children and the results may not be too pleasant for us as a society with set values and norms.
At a ceremony at the Christ The King Church in Accra recently to confirm 140 baptised Catholics into the faith, the Archbishop of Accra, Most Reverend Charles Palmer-Buckle asked parents to be wary of the “new armed robbers” and carriers of immorality they had introduced into their homes.
He said that while parents had built high walls around their houses and further fenced them with electric barbed wire, the new robbers they should look out for were the television and Internet they left their children with all day without supervision.
He said that those technologies were the sites where children were picking up some of the unacceptable societal behaviours today.
Thanks to television, today busy parents are able to concentrate on their search for money and other business away from home knowing that they will not be missed very much by their own children. Gradually, consciously or unconsciously, the television and Internet has taken a central role in our lives.
Some studies have suggested that apart from sleeping, one other thing that occupies and takes the time of children most is television watching. Children are able to become so glued to the set that even when their parents call out their names, they do not hear, and have to be called so loudly several times. They are even able to forgo meals in favour of television and there is a continuous struggle among siblings in the home for possession of the remote control.
To resolve this problem many parents have acquired more than two sets for the home, sometimes it’s one for each room in the home! Children sit in front of the television with text and notebooks in hand pretending to study with one eye on the television and the other on the notes! How this works out beats imagination! But they go on flipping from channel to channel and are more able to tell where Rihanna’s next concert is to take place, how many times Tom was able to get even with Jerry and why Lil Wayne is heading for jail rather than be able to tell you why one plus one will not make three.
In her review on Children, Television and Gender Roles , Elena Beasly notes that children spend an average of 3.3 hours a day in front of the television every day. Van Evra, Judith (1990) in her study into Television and Child Development finds that Children do not simply absorb TV information, but actively process it and impose their own interpretations and expectations.
Even though the power of television and the Internet is not absolute because of some intervening variables, some teenagers who have neither been to the US nor had physical contact with some American musicians for instance, dress like 50 cent with bling , earrings and tattoos and the male teenagers walk all day with one hand holding on to their crotch, their trousers constantly falling off and words such as s**t and f**k you flowing without inhibition from their mouth in the name of fashion and “ to be seen as “G” by their mates ! Where else could they have picked these attributes?
Children flip from channel to channel absorbing stuff that may not be suitable for their formative age. How many times haven't we heard about children being involved in some freak accident as a result of imitating some action figures, Batman, Danger Mouse etc on television? Add the influx of all some Nigerian movies which don’t get shown in Nigeria but show freely on our sets and the picture becomes even bleaker!
Then again are the health effects of our newly acquired sedentary life styles. Some sit and watch television as they push loads of snacks like pop corn into their mouth. This is in contrast to how not too long ago we used to walk to school, to get water, climbed trees, sang and created our own play items such as toys and ran after lizards. Before the introduction of the television in the 1920s and the growth of the mass media, our influences on how to behave in society was acquired from the family, the community and school. The growth of the mass media has had a significant impact on the lives of everyone with the television and Internet becoming a very power medium. Thanks to television and the Internet, our active way of life has been reduced to the minimum. So today we have teenagers with pot bellies!
But it’s not all doom for the relationship between us, the Internet and television. Television viewing has its positives. Television and the Internet are great sources of information and learning which could help in the development of social roles and behaviour. TV entertainment programmes kill our boredom. We are able to improve our language through sheer information sharing on television and we are able to learn history just by clicking the button of the Internet. The two mediums carry us to places where we have never been keeping us abreast of happenings in other parts of the world and business trends.
We are able to seal business transactions via communication on the Internet. Therefore television and the Internet maintain their primary role of providing information, education and entertainment which are positives. Through discussion programmes we are able to share our ideas and views which is a prerequisite for the thriving of democracy. Our leaders are able to know what we want and what we are thinking.
But the concerns raised about what these powerful mediums are doing cannot also be glossed over. If only parents could be available to guide their children, but alas, where is the time?
Afua Yeboah , a mother of two has had to impose strict sanctions at home,— No television on week days— As to whether she is at home always to ensure that her directives are followed is another matter. Addiction to TV seems to have no simple remedy. Television and the Internet cannot take the place of parenting but that is exactly the way it seems now. Parents send their children off to watch TV when they think they are worrying them to much when all they want is some time with them and to get their questions answered.
How can we create a healthy balance between television and Internet use and other household and community activities for ourselves and our children? One of the ways to go is to make sure that content is child friendly.
The earlier we think this issue out the better, else , like The Most Rev Palmer –Buckle said, we will build higher walls with high voltage electric barb wire fences hemming in these new robbers and our children and the results may not be too pleasant for us as a society with set values and norms.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Agbogbloshie Market: Sitting on a time bomb of filth
By Doreen Allotey
The sequel to a bad story often has a happy ending. Unfortunately in the case of the Agbogbloshie market located in Central Accra, it is a worsening scenario about which buyers must beware.
But this market performs such a critical role in the food distribution chain of the people of Accra that no effort must be spared to bring the conditions there to acceptable standards. Agbogbloshie is the supply point of most foodstuffs sold in the satellite markets of the city and only few households can claim not to prepare food sourced directly or indirectly from this market.
In an earlier article published in the Daily Graphic of September 17 this year with the headline “Agbogbloshie Market: The good, the bad and the ugly” a number of observations and recommendations were made.
One of them was that the insanitary conditions in the market posed a serious health problem to customers and consumers and that the city authorities should take serious steps to improve conditions in the market.
It was recommended also that there should be regular visits by food inspectors and that the displaying of food items such as oranges, plantains etc. on the bare floor should be prohibited . It was recommended that the Ghana Standards Board should re-introduce to the women, education on the advantages of weights and measures as an alternative to tins like the olonka and baskets which are stuffed with all manner of things.
Thankfully, the Accra Metropolitan Authority responded by announcing a decongestion exercise that was to involve the demolition of illegal structures. Others like the Makola and Kaneshie markets where the situation is virtually the same were to benefit from similar decongestion exercises. The decongestion was to be a general one to bring some order and sanity in the city. Unfortunately, the exercise was met with a storm of protests from the market vendors. Women in the Kaneshie market were even alleged to have chased the Chief executive Officer of the AMA, Mr Alfred Vanderpuije, away from the market with urine! Worse still, it is obvious that the political will to continue with the exercise is absent.
The Food and Drugs Board also run a workshop on food safety for food vendors in the market. FDB also plans to certify food vendors in the market by 2011.
I went back to the market to observe if there had been an improvement after the actions taken by the AMA and FDB. The situation is the same.
Of much concern is the sale of exposed semi-processed powdered food items such as gari, kokonte and sugar in the current environment of the dusty harmattan weather.
With some training on sampling from the FDB and some coaching from , a food safety consultancy, I took some random sterile samples of gari, kokonte and sugar at the market in triplicates.
The samples were sent to a food and beverage laboratory where each sample was tested.
The results were astounding. Except sugar which did not show infection for all its samples, gari and kokonte showed very heavy infection of bacteria and fungi in the form of moulds.
“Some of the growths would suggest the presence of Aspergilus species that produce chemicals called toxins which can cause food poisoning”, Mr George Berko, the microbiologist who worked on the samples said.
On the evidence of the undesirable habits that persist and the quality of exposed food products, food consumers are at risk. For a food item such as gari that can be eaten cold in the form of “soakings” the risk of food poisoning is real.
According to Mr Berko, “the heat of cooking may kill the microbes but the danger is that toxins are not eliminated by heat and do stay in the food even after cooking.” Indeed, there have been instances when people suffered from food poisoning after a meal of kokonte.
One wonders why such products are not packaged as we see them displayed on supermarket shelves. It is also not clear what type of education FDB carried out in the market. The sight of women selling semi-processed food items with their heads uncovered was common. Any stray piece of hair in food could cause allergy in consumers, a condition or illness shown as itching, swelling and general nausea.
In the course of enquiries about food safety it was not clear which regulatory body was responsible for laying down the standards of items sold in the market. Is it the Ghana Standards Board (GSB) GSB or Food and Drugs Board (FDB)? In one moment there was a statement like, “That’s not our responsibility; go to FDB” from GSB. At another moment we are told, “Go to GSB; it is their responsibility”
Therefore on FDB’s intention to certify food vendors, one wonders on whose standards the certification will be based. In view of the uncertainty that seems to exist between GSB and FDB on responsibilities, collaboration between the two institutions is necessary in laying down standards.
Specialists at NAMS have stressed that the standards must include the procedures on how the food is packaged and the level of sanitation of the surroundings and the health status of the vendors.
Education to the vendors must be on-going and not a one-day affair and vendors who will be found to be infringing the food safety laws must be banned from the market.
The earlier recommendations of September 17, 2009 are still valid.
The AMA must not only demolish unauthorised structures but actually regulate the number of vendors. It appears that AMA is only too eager to collect tolls from anybody desiring to sell in this market.
The defence the vendors put up during any decongestion exercise is, “We have every right to sell here because we pay daily tolls. We don’t have anywhere to go.” Congestion is about structures and human numbers. The AMA should therefore regulate numbers through licensing.
For a comprehensive research, it is recommended that a more rigorous survey be carried out on semi-processed food items in our markets as a basis for the intended certification of the vendors.
It is further recommended that food packaging standards, once instituted, be enforced.
The role that Agbogbloshie, and indeed any market, plays in our life are so important that standards and hygiene cannot be compromised.
The sequel to a bad story often has a happy ending. Unfortunately in the case of the Agbogbloshie market located in Central Accra, it is a worsening scenario about which buyers must beware.
But this market performs such a critical role in the food distribution chain of the people of Accra that no effort must be spared to bring the conditions there to acceptable standards. Agbogbloshie is the supply point of most foodstuffs sold in the satellite markets of the city and only few households can claim not to prepare food sourced directly or indirectly from this market.
In an earlier article published in the Daily Graphic of September 17 this year with the headline “Agbogbloshie Market: The good, the bad and the ugly” a number of observations and recommendations were made.
One of them was that the insanitary conditions in the market posed a serious health problem to customers and consumers and that the city authorities should take serious steps to improve conditions in the market.
It was recommended also that there should be regular visits by food inspectors and that the displaying of food items such as oranges, plantains etc. on the bare floor should be prohibited . It was recommended that the Ghana Standards Board should re-introduce to the women, education on the advantages of weights and measures as an alternative to tins like the olonka and baskets which are stuffed with all manner of things.
Thankfully, the Accra Metropolitan Authority responded by announcing a decongestion exercise that was to involve the demolition of illegal structures. Others like the Makola and Kaneshie markets where the situation is virtually the same were to benefit from similar decongestion exercises. The decongestion was to be a general one to bring some order and sanity in the city. Unfortunately, the exercise was met with a storm of protests from the market vendors. Women in the Kaneshie market were even alleged to have chased the Chief executive Officer of the AMA, Mr Alfred Vanderpuije, away from the market with urine! Worse still, it is obvious that the political will to continue with the exercise is absent.
The Food and Drugs Board also run a workshop on food safety for food vendors in the market. FDB also plans to certify food vendors in the market by 2011.
I went back to the market to observe if there had been an improvement after the actions taken by the AMA and FDB. The situation is the same.
Of much concern is the sale of exposed semi-processed powdered food items such as gari, kokonte and sugar in the current environment of the dusty harmattan weather.
With some training on sampling from the FDB and some coaching from , a food safety consultancy, I took some random sterile samples of gari, kokonte and sugar at the market in triplicates.
The samples were sent to a food and beverage laboratory where each sample was tested.
The results were astounding. Except sugar which did not show infection for all its samples, gari and kokonte showed very heavy infection of bacteria and fungi in the form of moulds.
“Some of the growths would suggest the presence of Aspergilus species that produce chemicals called toxins which can cause food poisoning”, Mr George Berko, the microbiologist who worked on the samples said.
On the evidence of the undesirable habits that persist and the quality of exposed food products, food consumers are at risk. For a food item such as gari that can be eaten cold in the form of “soakings” the risk of food poisoning is real.
According to Mr Berko, “the heat of cooking may kill the microbes but the danger is that toxins are not eliminated by heat and do stay in the food even after cooking.” Indeed, there have been instances when people suffered from food poisoning after a meal of kokonte.
One wonders why such products are not packaged as we see them displayed on supermarket shelves. It is also not clear what type of education FDB carried out in the market. The sight of women selling semi-processed food items with their heads uncovered was common. Any stray piece of hair in food could cause allergy in consumers, a condition or illness shown as itching, swelling and general nausea.
In the course of enquiries about food safety it was not clear which regulatory body was responsible for laying down the standards of items sold in the market. Is it the Ghana Standards Board (GSB) GSB or Food and Drugs Board (FDB)? In one moment there was a statement like, “That’s not our responsibility; go to FDB” from GSB. At another moment we are told, “Go to GSB; it is their responsibility”
Therefore on FDB’s intention to certify food vendors, one wonders on whose standards the certification will be based. In view of the uncertainty that seems to exist between GSB and FDB on responsibilities, collaboration between the two institutions is necessary in laying down standards.
Specialists at NAMS have stressed that the standards must include the procedures on how the food is packaged and the level of sanitation of the surroundings and the health status of the vendors.
Education to the vendors must be on-going and not a one-day affair and vendors who will be found to be infringing the food safety laws must be banned from the market.
The earlier recommendations of September 17, 2009 are still valid.
The AMA must not only demolish unauthorised structures but actually regulate the number of vendors. It appears that AMA is only too eager to collect tolls from anybody desiring to sell in this market.
The defence the vendors put up during any decongestion exercise is, “We have every right to sell here because we pay daily tolls. We don’t have anywhere to go.” Congestion is about structures and human numbers. The AMA should therefore regulate numbers through licensing.
For a comprehensive research, it is recommended that a more rigorous survey be carried out on semi-processed food items in our markets as a basis for the intended certification of the vendors.
It is further recommended that food packaging standards, once instituted, be enforced.
The role that Agbogbloshie, and indeed any market, plays in our life are so important that standards and hygiene cannot be compromised.
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