Preliminary findings about the gendered impacts of oil and gas exploration, development and land use in areas like Akwidae, Achoawa, Miamia, Egyambra, Dixcove, Princess Town and Cape Three Points in the Western Region revealed that, due to ignorance, hundreds of acres of land are being given out to investors for meager amounts.
"In one community we learnt that about 143 acres of land has been sold for GHc 1000 (ten million old cedis) which cannot buy even an acre of land in Accra. How would the people have their fair share of the land to continue their farming with this distribution of prime natural resources or community assets?" asked Dr. Rudith King of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST).
She lamented that 60% of information indicates that only some civil society organization and NGOs are sensitizing the people, citing Friends of the Nation as one of the CSO that has been educating the people.
She was speaking at a forum in Accra organized by NETRIGHT under its Gender, Oil and Gas Project. It was under the theme "Engaging with Oil and Gas Issues from a Gender Perspective."
Dr. King noted that gender concerns are been raised now to pave the way to engage effectively on policy.
She expressed the fear that the capital intensive oil sector could replace the labour intensive subsistence agricultural sector and may not create balanced growth and development. Already widespread unemployment is reported to have hit some communities in the Western Region, where oil has been discovered.
The limited employment opportunities in these areas are being threatened by the oil industry.
With the main livelihoods in such areas being fishing, farming and petty trading at the subsistence level, the farmers, especially women are currently limited as to how far they can go.
"Are we creating awareness for our youth to know what is involved and about the implications of the oil? Are we going to allow our female children to fall victim to commercial sex working with its attendant factors such as HIV/AIDS?" she inquired.
She added that the outcome of schools is not encouraging to give people there employment, as the youth do not go beyond Junior High School, looking at the fact that oil extraction is a technology driven business.
"With high unemployment levels and with this level of education will they be able to find jobs? Outsiders will come and take the jobs because we don't have the expertise."
Dr. King cautioned that Ghana may be sitting on a time bomb because if the youth see other people working and they don't have jobs, one day they will explode.
"There is looming danger ahead and all of us must work to guard against it.""Compensation for land use and degradation must be enforced. Assembly men and women and communities must be sensitized about the critical gender issues and ccommunities have the right to protect and make demands from state institutions responsible for such decisions".
The Convener of NETRIGHT, Dr. Rose Mensah-Kutin explained her organization's Gender, Oil and Gas Project is intended as a learning process for women to understand better so they can engage effectively.
"Social relationship is at the centre of any national development, so as women can also contribute as far as learning and experience of oil and gas is concerned."
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