Ghana's Environment Threatened By Importation Of Second-hand Vehicles

Over one million vehicles of all types were imported into Ghana from 2005-2016, according to the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority.

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Out of these, a whopping 80% were second hand vehicles whose Carbon dioxide emissions (CO2) and fuel consumption are not compliant with modern day manufacturing standards and therefore, threaten Ghana’s environment.

These vehicles, which are the mainstay of Ghana’s transport sector, are said to consume more than half of the total oil import and production of the nation and releases virtually a quarter of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere.

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Addressing a stakeholder’s workshop held by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, Minister of Environment, through a speech read on his behalf said, the International Energy Agency had revealed that the world-wide transport sector accounts for about 50 per cent of world energy consumption while transport consumes 25 per cent of the world’s energy with 90 per cent for fossil fuels.

He said the transport sector was also known to have the fastest growth rate of Greenhouse House emissions (GHG), which was about 2.5 per cent per year until 2020.

He noted that the widespread of vehicles in the country also had a real environmental and economic cost and represents an important threat to the economic security of the nation.

Therefore, the Government had taken bold steps to phase out lead in fuels in 2003 and implemented Mass Transport system in the urban areas in a bid to reduce the number of vehicles that plied the road and polluted the atmosphere.