The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources through it’s Planning, Policy, Monitoring & Evaluation Unit, has embarked on an extensive field trip on four project sites by The National Alternative Employment and Livelihood Programme ( NAELP), an intervention spearheaded by the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, which has provided jobs for over 80,000 people whose lives were dependent on illegal mining.
The Ministry officials inspected the progress of work on several fields for reclamation projects and nursing of seedlings.
At Asawinso A, the team inspected a 291.01 acres of Teak and Ofram plantation being worked on by the NAELP project team.
A similar story was also reported at Asawinso B where Teak and ofram trees have been planted on an 492. 48 acres plantation.
Also at Mpesiem, through the intervention of NAELP, out of the 142.58 acres of land, 88.03 was reclaimed after activities of illegal Mining with Ofram and teak seedlings planted on the site.
The Technical Officer for NALEP, Mr. Daniel Agyeman indicated that the Programme, first of all, seeks to ameliorate the unavoidable and unintended hardships caused by Government’s resolve in the fight against illegal Mining.
He further explained saying “our efforts to sanitize the Small-Scale mining sector has created hardship and disruption of economic activity, particularly in the five regions that Operation Halt II carried out its mandate.
He continued that the program “is intended to provide good economic livelihood options to illegal mining and associated activities, to enable those adversely impacted to work and support themselves and their families.”
The Technical Officer further outlined the various modules of NAELP which he described as; National Land Reclamation and Re-Afforestation Programme, Agriculture and Agro-Processing, Apprenticeship, Skills Training and Entrepreneurship, Responsible, Viable and Sustainable Small-Scale Community Mining, Mine Support Services and Community Enhancements Project.
He hinted that many of the beneficiaries of NAELP have been deployed mainly into the land restoration and re-afforestation programme, the first module of the NAELP.
Mr. Agyeman also highlighted, that as part of the programme, some of the beneficiaries were instrumental in the nursing and planting of 20 million economic seedlings, an initiative which was anchored on the Green Ghana project.
Receiving the team, Mr. Afriyie Owusu Bempa, a worker at the site indicated that activities of Galamsey operators have started resurfacing the Reclamation site, while land owners have started demanding for their land which makes it difficult to execute their mandate and called for quick response from government.
