The majority of Ghana's income and jobs are produced directly and indirectly by the land, which is a vital resource for our nation's prosperity. It sustains the provision of ecosystem services as well as the agricultural, forestry, and fishing livelihoods of the vast majority of people, particularly those living in rural areas. Despite these advantages, there are a number of temporal and spatial factors contributing to the degradation of our land resources, such as deforestation, erosion, declining soil fertility and productivity, deterioration of rangelands, desertification, and deterioration of water bodies (quantity and quality).
Ghana's drylands in the northern Sudanese and Guinea savannah regions are especially at risk from erosion; in these areas, land deterioration is known as "desertification." The risk of desertification is present on about 35% of Ghana's land. An estimated $1.4 billion, or 6% of Ghana's GDP, is lost to land degradation each year in the country.
Desertification.
The Challenges of Desertification in Ghana.
Due to the country's geographic location and unsustainable exploitation of its natural resources, desertification is becoming a major economic, social, and environmental concern in Ghana. Ghana, which is located in the Sahel region of West Africa, has an arid and semi-arid climate, which makes it especially vulnerable to desertification and the negative consequences of climate change. These environmental problems are further made worse by population pressure. According to UN reports from 2019, Ghana's expanding population is placing more stress on the country's agricultural areas, which is causing pesticide use to rise and massive deforestation to satisfy the country's population needs. As a result, there has been a significant decline in woods in northern Ghana, a trend that is happening at an alarming rate. Furthermore, wildfires and overgrazing are major contributors to the issue.
Over the past 20 years, Ghana's land degradation has increased substantially, with the northern and central regions experiencing the most severe deterioration. It is estimated that "severe to very severe" erosion affects 70% of Ghana. The rates of soil erosion in the Upper West, Northern, Brong Ahafo, and Upper East Regions are high, and between 2000 and 2016, there was a notable decline in Net Primary Productivity (NPP), a gauge of the health of the vegetation. Apart from the northern areas, there is significant soil erosion in the upper Volta Region, Brong Ahafo, and Accra. This erosion is made worse by poor urban planning in Accra, which has compromised the integrity of the soil. An estimate of the financial cost of soil erosion places it at US$0.54 billion, or 0.9% of Ghana's GDP.