Illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing costs the African continent $2.3 billion yearly, while careless fishing methods cost Ghana more than $200 million.
The Ghanaian government has been urged to guarantee the sustainable use of natural resources by Professor Wisdom Akpalu, dean of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration’s School of Research and Graduate Studies.
Fishing Costs
To increase the production of goods and services rather than just consuming them, he urged the government to make investments in roads, hospitals, education, and other types of capital.
Akpalu ascribed the issue to a lack of knowledge or access to scientific information about the management of natural resources, corruption, political expediency, and weak negotiating stances with foreign investors regarding natural resources.
- IAU fishing costs Africa $2.3 billion, and Ghana $200 million.
- He advocates government investments in infrastructure, healthcare, and education.
- Preserve renewable resources by limiting extraction rate.
By making sure that the rate of extraction does not exceed the resource’s ability to replenish itself, renewable resources can be preserved.
He emphasized the significance of understanding the resource’s stock and bioregions, interactions with its environment, species variety, reproductive potential, and the relationship between effort applied and harvest or catch.
Additionally, he mentioned that 30% of Africa’s wild fish populations were overexploited while 60% of them were fully utilized.
