Fire is an integral tool for land use and management in Ghana • Reduce the cost of labor in a farm • Control some pests and diseases and livestock parasites • Produces ash containing highly soluble nutrients to improve crop yields • For trapping game

1. #GLFClimate
Fire-smart landscape approach
in Ghana
Kwame Appiah Owusu & Mercy Owusu Ansah
Global Landscape Forum – 12 November 2022
Session: Fire-smart landscapes as promising approach for effective adaptation and mitigation

2. Fire-Smart Landscape governance Programme
Tropenbos International
Vision: Reduced or eliminated risk of
wildfire events for the benefits of
sustainable use of forest and trees in
climate smart landscapes
Approach: Applying a landscape
approach for fire management

3. Fire is an integral tool for land use and
management in Ghana
• Reduce the cost of labor in a farm
• Control some pests and diseases and
livestock parasites
• Produces ash containing highly soluble
nutrients to improve crop yields
• For trapping game
Introduction

4. • Poor fire management practices result in
widespread wildfire events, coupled
with increasing warming weather
conditions.
• Understanding traditional people’s fire
practices, knowledge and perceptions on
fire use can help develop fire-smart
alternative actions toward fire use and
behavior.
Introduction

5. Why fire-smart landscape
approach in Ghana
• Proposes social solutions for the social
construct of the wildfire problem.
• Conciliates interests from different actors
through the establishment of agreements.
• Builds trust between citizens and
organizations.
• Makes suppression activities easier and
more efficacious.
• Introduces and maintains wildfire risk
reduction in the daily life of people without
additional costs, so easier to maintain
through the time.

6. How Tropenbos Ghana is
reducing the risk of wildfires?
• Multistakeholder platforms (Ghana National Fire
Service, Forestry Commission, COCOBOD, Police,
etc.).
• Working with Indigenous people
• Community fire volunteer (CFV) squads.
• Prevention campaigns for the public, school pupils,
and villages
• Community adoption of rules (bye-laws) i.e.:
Burning starts after 2-3 rains at the end of the dry
season in March.

7. Way forward
• Resource and intensify multistakeholder platforms for
intercultural exchange and participatory dialogue between
stakeholders.
• Building knowledge and capability through training of local
communities on firefighting.
• Develop incentives (a certification system) for areas
organized as FSL to support and compensate individuals,
communities, and organizations for their efforts to reduce
and maintain wildfire risk at low levels
• Distribution of fire-resistant tree seedlings to farmers to
plant.
• Support hunters with an alternative source of livelihood i.e.
animal rearing.

8. Thank you
Kwame Appiah Owusu & Mercy Owusu Ansah
kaowusu@tropenbosgh.org & mercyowusuansah@yahoo.com
For questions about the Tropenbos programme please contact Rosalien Jezeer
Rosalien.Jezeer@tropenbos.org