Ghana is a small African country on the Gulf of Guinea, with Ivory Coast to the west and Togo on the east. Small villages along the coastline are gradually vanishing due to coastal erosion in Ghana generally. The world appears to be watching dispassionately as the poor suffer the brunt of global warming once again.
The Private Face of Coastal Erosion in Ghana
Foreign Policy Group took the wraps off these unofficial secrets on October 21, 2016. It told the story of David Buabasah who is watching waves carry away his home. “When the big waves come, they can easily kill you,” he says. “Last week, the ocean took away part of my house while my family was sleeping inside.”
As the correspondent watched, the tide propelled a succession of waves into David Buabasah’s village. The residents could do nothing about saltwater pooling in their town and walls crumbling away. There are no decent levees there, and no engineers to prevent coastal erosion in Ghana carrying their belongings into the ocean. This is climate change in the raw as it happens, not dressed up in the minds of politicians.
Climate Change is Accelerating Coastal Erosion
However, climate change is the precipitating factor here, but not the root cause. Sand mining for dams started the rot followed by construction of deep sea ports. These trap sediments that might otherwise have replenished the beaches. The residents are innocent; however the lack of global response is as if they are the cause.
David Buabasah has watched as his village gradually vanish from the narrow coastal strip in his lifetime. The people retreated until they ran out of options. Since then, they have watched the waves claw away their natural defenses, the gently waving coconut palms.
Their homes, and all they have left are naked now. Sans roofs, sans doors and windows. And sans hope in this age of coastal erosion in Ghana.
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