Civil Society Ready To Speak Out On The Natural Resource And Environment Sector In Ghana

The Natural Resource and Environment (NRE) sector in Ghana is critical to national development. More than a hundred civil society organisations, media and research institutions applied for funding with the Kasa project to strengthen their work across the country for equitable access, accountability, and transparency in the natural resource and environment sector.
The twenty-six (26) organisations selected for funding will be addressing different aspects of natural resource and environmental governance, which are of concern for sustainable growth in Ghana. Civil society, media and research organisations can play a vital role in strengthening governance in for instance the oil, mining and forest sectors in Ghana.
The twenty-six (26) new grants for projects and programmes are of relevance to the Government’s Natural Resource and Environment Governance (NREG) Sector Budget Support (SBS) Mechanism that seeks to strengthen governance in the areas of forestry, mining and environmental protection. The current NREG time frame is 2007-2012.
Kasa funded grants will support initiatives across the entire country. They all focus on enabling civil society, research and the media to more effectively contribute to policy dialogue in climate change, mining, environmental protection, forests management and revenue sharing, as well as oil, land tenure, bio fuels, and other thematic areas in the natural resource and environment sector.
Kasa invites the media and other interested stakeholders to contact the individual organisations for further information on the various projects funded. The Kasa secretariat can also facilitate the necessary contacts.
Kasa is a civil society support mechanism implemented by CARE, ICCO and SNV with support from The Royal Netherlands Embassy. Its initial two-year pilot design supports civil society, research and media organisations to advocate, in a concerted effort, for equitable access, accountability, and transparency in natural resource and environmental governance in Ghana. The project strengthens existing civil society organisations, as well as, coalitions and networks through capacity building, provision of grants and also creates platforms for information sharing.The total amount of grants being disbursed currently is One Million, Six Hundred and Fifty Eight Thousand, Three Hundred and Twenty-Nine Ghana Cedis (GH1,658,329).

Source:Kasa Office,Accra.