- The U.S. foreign aid freeze blocks the establishment of Ghana’s first Marine Protected Area (MPA).
- The MPA was being created under the Ghana Fisheries Recovery Activity (GFRA), a USAID-funded program that aimed to restore pelagic fish stocks crucial for the country’s food security.
- Ghana’s small pelagics, consisting mostly of sardines, anchovy and mackerels, make up about 60% of local fish landings and serve as a primary source of protein for almost two-thirds of the country’s population.
- The West African nation depended heavily on U.S. foreign aid to preserve its small pelagic fisheries sector, and without other funding, there could be cascading impacts on its economy.
For more than 10 years, researchers, civil society and community members and government officials in Ghana worked to create the West African nation’s first marine protected area (MPA). In January, the newly elected U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly froze foreign aid, including to Ghana, jeopardizing the MPA’s establishment and dealing a blow to Ghana’s fisheries sector.
Creating the MPA was a flagship initiative under the Ghana Fisheries Recovery Activity (GFRA) program, which was fully funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
“The USAID freeze sent shock waves around the world — and Ghana has also felt the impact,” Evans Kwasi Arizi, chairperson of the MPA technical committee, told Mongabay. He explained that Ghanaians rely heavily on small pelagic fisheries like sardinellas, anchovies and mackerel, and Ghana’s fisheries sector has, till now, benefited greatly from U.S. foreign aid.
Without alternative funding, the sudden termination of the GFRA could create a lot of hardship for Ghanaians, Arizi, who is a fisheries scientist at the University of Cape Coast, Ghana, told Mongabay. “If the fisheries collapse, it is going to inflict an economic crisis on the local people.”
The funding contract between USAID and Tetra Tech, the U.S.-based engineering consultancy implementing the GFRA, was canceled in the last week of February, Tetra Tech employees, who were not authorized to speak to the media, told Mongabay.
USAID had provided $750,000 in technical assistance to the MPA project, which Tetra Tech implemented in collaboration with local contractors and the Ghanaian government. The funding covered the cost of hiring legal advisers and scientists as well as conducting stakeholder engagement.
The proposed MPA was supposed to cover 700 square kilometers (270 square miles) of seascape in the Greater Cape Three Point Area (GCTPA) at the most southern tip of Ghana. The GCTPA is a key spawning and nursery habitat for small pelagic fish, according to a report published by USAID and Tetra Tech in July 2024.
A management plan was already in the works and the government was expected to designate the MPA by 2026.
According to Maame Esi Bordah-Quayson, an official at Ghana’s Fisheries Commission, the USAID funds were key to passing the MPA law and to operationalizing it. She said activities like developing and validating the MPA management plan, conducting public awareness campaigns and training community members and public officials depended on the funds.
Arizi said the MPA technical advisory committee, which used to meet regularly to provide recommendations and advance the approval process, has stopped meeting since the U.S. government’s decision to pull funding. Without continued stakeholder engagement and technical assessments, the timeline for establishing the MPA remains uncertain.
“All of a sudden, we are faced with a situation where we do not have funds to keep the contact to the community and navigate the policy spaces,” Stephen Kankam, deputy director of Hen Mpoane, a local organization supporting coastal communities, told Mongabay. “We have to reach out to the government to keep the momentum [for creating the MPA] alive.”
Hen Mpoane had been Tetra Tech’s key partner in the MPA creation process. With 60% of its annual budget coming from USAID, Hen Mpoane has been forced to scale down its operations, just like around 20 other local contractors of Tetra Tech. “It has not just an impact on us as an NGO, but also on the [marine] ecosystem and the communities we serve,” said Kankam.
The MPA’s establishment would have marked a crucial step toward safeguarding Ghana’s small pelagic fisheries sector.
Ghana’s small pelagics, consisting mostly of sardines, anchovies and mackerels, are critical to the country’s food security and for its economy, making up about 60% of local fish landings and serving as a primary source of protein for almost two-thirds of Ghana’s population. An estimated 3 million people are directly or indirectly involved in the fisheries sector.
However, decades of overfishing, illegal fishing practices and environmental pressures have led to a significant decline of small pelagic fish stocks over the past decades to a point where they are on the cusp of collapse.
With the USAID contract with Tetra Tech being terminated, the pressure will be on the Ghanaian government to compensate for the missing funds.
Bordah-Quayson from the Fisheries Commission expressed concerns over the suspension but couldn’t provide clarity on the fate of previously USAID-funded initiatives. She said the commission was going to implement the GFRA work plan alongside its own and will be forced to find other funding to do so.
There is concern that the MPA could disappear from the agenda altogether, especially with a new government in power in Ghana since the December 2024 elections.
The Ministry of Fisheries and Aquaculture Development’s director of research, statistics and information management, Ishmael Nii Adjei Browne, said the freeze has significant implications for Ghana’s fisheries sector beyond the establishment of the MPA.
“USAID has supported initiatives like the closed fishing season, which allows fish populations to recover, thereby promoting sustainable fishing practices,” Browne said.
The U.S. foreign aid agency had been a major player in the West African country’s fisheries sector since 2009, investing millions of dollars to restore declining fish stocks and to protect coastal livelihoods. The GFRA was part of the USAID’s Feed the Future initiative, announced by former President Barack Obama’s administration to address hunger and food insecurity across the world. The program was to have an outlay of $24 million over five years (2021-26) aimed at restoring Ghana’s severely depleted small pelagic fishery.
“Had it not been for that [USAID] intervention, [fish] stocks would have collapsed by now, or collapsed a long time ago,” Arizi said.
Jojo Solomon, head of the Ghana National Canoe Fishermen Council (GNCFC) was concerned about the impact of the funding freeze on livelihoods and food security.
“It’s like someone removed the oxygen mask from our faces,” Solomon said.
According to Solomon, USAID-backed policies such as the closed seasons for artisanal fishers, a moratorium on new entrants into the marine space and a co-management policy, have led to improved fisheries management.
The GFRA also provided alternative livelihoods training for young fishers to reduce pressure on the small pelagic sector. At the time of the termination, 5,250 youth were in various stages of training.
Doris Owusu, who was formerly the GFRA’s sustainable coastal livelihoods specialist, said all those youth would now be unable to complete their training.
But, Kankam at Hen Mpoane also saw opportunities in the freeze. “This is a wake-up call for African countries,” he said, suggesting that the termination of U.S. aid could be a chance to tap other funding sources, particularly the private sector and philanthropists. “We as Africans need to step up and take control of our development. We can’t wait for others to do it for us.”
Banner image: Fishers in Ghana carry their nets on the beach. Image by Brett Elliott via Flickr (Public domain).
Indonesia seeks alternative funding as USAID freeze delays marine conservation efforts
Citation:
Asiedu, B., Okpei, P., Nunoo, F. K., & Failler, P. (2021). A fishery in distress: An analysis of the small pelagic fishery of Ghana. Marine Policy, 129, 104500. doi:10.1016/j.marpol.2021.104500
Credits
