Ghana risks losing seed sources due to illegal mining – Dr Asomaning

The National Tree Seed Cen­tre (NTSC) of the country has expressed grave concerns over the continuous destruction of seed sources in the country by illegal miners.

According to the Centre, all the endemic species peculiar to Ghana were being destroyed, stressing that, “It is likely the country’s bio­diversity will soon be lost if care is not taken to reverse the situation.”

Dr Joseph Mireku Asomaning, Seed Conservation Technique Course Project Coordinator, at the Forestry Research Institute of Ghana of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR-FORIG), disclosed to the Ghana­ian Times, here.

It was during the opening cere­mony of a week’s intensive training programme on “Ex Situ” conserva­tion of seeds in the country.

Ex Situ conservation refers to the removal of the seeds from their original or natural location for conservation in a specialised environment, for research, or for other purposes.

Organised by the CSIR-FORIG, participants and experts came from Guinea, Sierra Leone and the United Kingdom to find ways and means of conserving the country’s seeds.

It was in collaboration with the Millennium Seed Bank (MSB) and Royal Botanic Gardens (KEW).

Dr Asomaning, a former head of the NTSC, was worried about what he described as “massive destruc­tion of seeds sources in the coun­try due to “galamsey” activities.”

He said the government’s efforts to restore the degraded lands due to the massive destruction could be in vain “because the seeds are getting extinct…we need the seeds, without which we can’t do anything.”

The Project Coordinator said they had the expertise and efforts that were being made by the In­stitute to regenerate the country’s forests’ estate and the storage of seeds, among others, describing the training as very crucial to Ghana.

He said it was time to remove the seeds from the forests and conserve them, and the training aimed at learning new techniques of the conservation of the seeds.

According to Dr Asomaning, the country really needed to develop seed sources for the protection of the forests.

“We are doing our best by using the existing plantation to obtain our seeds, but we need to have a lot of seed sources created by our­selves, else reforestation activities in the country would go down,” he emphasised.

He used the occasion to appeal to cocoa and other farmers to plant trees in their farms, and not cut down tree species.

Mr Tim Pearce, an official with the MSB, KEW, said they were poised to use the best possi­ble practices to conserve the seeds to boost the country’s biodiversity.

He observed that all over the world, due to population growth, vegetation was being affected, not only in Ghana and there was the need for new techniques to con­serve seeds for future generations.

Dr Kwame Antwi Oduro, Direc­tor, CSIR-FORIG, stated that the Institute’s mandate included under­taking forest products and related research to disseminate results and commercialising research outputs.