GHANA: Ghana Among 36 Countries To Be Visited By Travellers In 2016.

Ghana named among world’s Top Travel Destinations for 2016

Ghana has been listed among 36 countries to be visited by travellers in 2016. The list was compiled by a group of 35 experienced and well-travelled bloggers from around the world, who specialise in adventure travel, ecotourism, cultural travel and family travel.

Ghana continues to find a sustainable means of expanding and harnessing its tourism potential in order to attract local and foreign tourists alike.

In recent times, the country’s Tourism Ministry and its implementing agency, the Ghana Tourism Authority have continued to introduce and expand a wide array of tourism related programmes and activities in order to sustain interest and increase earnings within the sector.

A member of the group who usually writes about the country, Elin Reitehaug reiterates this by a short summary on the country’s tourism sector; ‘’you are invited’’ is the standard phrase uttered when Ghanaians start eating. As a traveler in Ghana, you are always invited. Hike Afadjato, the highest mountain in Ghana, or go bird watching on a canopy walk in the rainforest of Kakum National Park, the country’s first protected area. To spot elephants, visit Mole National Park.

In Bolgantaga you’ll discover the rich culture of the Frafra people, known for weaving the world-famous Bolga baskets. In Elmina and along Cape Coast you’ll find several castles and forts recognised by UNESCO. Enjoy the beaches, which are popular for locals during weekends and holidays, when families and young people come to swim and play. Learn to play drums from energetic musicians at the Art Centre in Accra, or attend cultural events such as festivals and traditional celebrations of birth, marriage and death.’

The list also comprised countries such as, Quebec, South Africa, India, Bolivia, Brazil, Botswana, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Colombia, Cuba, Ethiopia, Greenland, Madagascar, Mauritius, Canada, South Africa, among others and was put together by Green Global Travel, an Ecotourism, Nature/Wildlife Conservation and Cultural Preservation Magazine.

UGANDA: The Baker Trail

African Explorer and Anthropologist Julian Monroe Fisher, in conjunction with The Uganda Ministry of Tourism, Wildlife & Antiquities, The Uganda Wildlife Authority, the Ministry of Wildlife, Conservation & Tourism for South Sudan, the descendants of the Victorian explorer Sir Samuel White Baker, Rail Riders Adventure Clothing and Costa Del Mar Sunglasses has announced plans to establish The Sir Samuel and Lady Florence Baker Historical Trail.

According to www.thebakertrail.com ,The trail will stretch from Gondokoro, the location of the modern day capital of the new nation of South Sudan to Baker's View overlooking Lake Albert in western Uganda. Fisher will be in Uganda to start placing historical markers at locations where Sir Samuel and Lady Florence Baker camped while on expedition in the Central African region during their two expeditions in the 1860's and 1870's.

In January-February 2013, during Phase Two of The RailRider's 2012-16 Great African Expedition, Fisher and his team that included David Baker, the great-great-grandson of Sir Samuel Baker were accredited with correcting maps of Uganda by establishing the true location of Baker's View, the location where Sir Samuel Baker became the first European to see Lake Albert and to subsequently name the lake for Prince Albert.

The concept for 'The Sir Samuel and Lady Florence Baker Historical Trail' evolved out of Fisher's two year research of Sir Samuel Baker in preparation for Phase One & Two of 'The RailRider's 2012-16 Great African Expedition'.
Quoting David Baker from Chirton, Wiltshire, United Kingdom, "Sir Samuel Baker and Lady Florence Baker's achievements are to be commemorated by the establishment of a trail through South Sudan and northern Uganda to Baker's view of Lake Albert.

The trail follows the shoreline of Lake Albert northwards to the Victoria Nile and the mighty Murchison Falls and up the river to the Karuma Falls. This is the bold vision of Julian Monroe Fisher who, in early 2013, travelled along the trail in the footsteps of Sir Samuel Baker. It will take energy, determination and resources to achieve this; our example is Sir Samuel Baker, so we are sure it will come about!"

Quoting Fisher, "The Bakers are respected in South Sudan and Uganda for their 1860's and 1870's expeditions and their effort to abolish the slave trade. Today South Sudan and parts of northern Uganda are emerging from years of conflict. In South Sudan the population is struggling to clean up the landmines of the conflicts of the past in order to move forward to a bright future. The future of the region lies in the success of projects like 'The Sir Samuel and Lady Florence Baker Historical Trail'.

With the support of Honorable Minister Maria Mutagamba, Executive Director Dr. Andrew Ggunga Seguya the Uganda Wildlife Authority, the Baker Family, Rail Riders Adventure Clothing and Costa Del Mar Sunglasses, the Uganda portion of 'The Sir Samuel and Lady Florence Baker Historical Trail' will be launched in January 2014 to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Baker's expedition. This will be a visual sign of the region, expressing to the world that northern Uganda and South Sudan are "open for business".

During the announcement of the project in Vienna, Austria, Fisher said, "The beauty of the people as well as the landscape should be reasons enough to visit the region sooner than later. 'The Sir Samuel and Lady Florence Baker Historical Trail' provides the adventure traveler a route through a spectacular scenery and to historical places, that can be accessed by 4 x 4's, mountain bike and also by hiking and will some day be recognized similar to the Appalachian Trail and the Pacific Trail in the USA.

MALAYSIA: Destruction Of Forests By Palm Oil Company Contiues

Data shows that in 2014, Malaysia experienced deforestation and plantation activity on more than 493,000 hectares of its land area, with 171,743 hectares affected in Sarawak alone.

The company is continuing to develop a large plantation in a Sarawak peat forest despite a government commitment to conservation.

Local and international environmental activists have alleged that BLD Plantation Bhd, a Malaysian palm oil company with a less than stellar sustainability record, is relentlessly deforesting a peat-rich land concession it holds in the country’s vulnerable and oft-exploited Sarawak State.

Satellite images recently from Friends of the Orangutans (FOTO Malaysia), to Mongabay appear to show that the firm is significantly revving up its destructive operations on the Lassa Land District concession, located in Sibu, Sarawak.

BLD is thought to have felled some 10,600 hectares of the 20,466-hectare plot since it obtained the lease in 2000, and new data and images suggest the company has continued clearing about 11 hectares per day between June 30 and September 18 of this year, or over 900 hectares in roughly two and a half months.

BLD’s rampant deforestation was among the topics brought up in an October meeting between Sarawak Chief Minister Tan Sri Adenan and a coalition of activists and specialists from NGOs including FOTO Malaysia, the Center for International Policy (CIP), Borneo Resources Institute (Brimas) and Sarawak Dayak Iban Association (SATIA), among others.

The group sought to encourage Adenan, who has drawn praise for his willingness to address and acknowledge the state’s alarming forestry situation, to put into practice more sustainable initiatives in Sarawak. Tied into that discussion were BLD’s plans to expand its operations.

“We were inspired to hear you say that, ‘We should all look at forests as a naturalist would, not just a source of dollars,” the NGOs wrote in a letter to Adenan after the meeting. “Of course, as you said, what counts is not the commitment, but the implementation.”

However, in the case of BLD, it seems that if a tree falls in Sarawak and somebody is around to hear it, the government will still not make a sound.

“It appears that the Sarawak government will neither take any action nor even reply our to emails,” said Upreshpal Singh, Friends of the Orangutans Director.

Sarawak’s tacit approval of BLD’s continued clearance of this valuable forestland — an area listed in a 1982 report by Sarawak’s Agriculture Department as nonetheless unsuitable for agriculture — will likely have drastic ecological and social consequences down the road, Singh said.

“This concession sits on very deep peat so that deforestation results in massive CO2 emission, and increase the severity and frequency of flooding,” he said in an email. “In addition to that, local communities are being threatened and kicked out from their ancestral lands by BLD.”

Malaysia’s natural resource-driven industries have consistently devastated its invaluable forests and peatlands. Last year, according to data from the forest monitoring platform Global Forest Watch, Malaysia experienced deforestation and plantation activity on more than 493,000 hectares of its land area, with 171,743 hectares affected in Sarawak alone.

Furthermore, nearly all of the timber being felled in Sarawak in recent years is believed to derive from natural forests rather than plantations, potentially destroying habitats for threatened species such as hornbills, orangutans and Borneo pygmy elephants.

It’s not just wildlife that is crucially affected by Malaysia’s often-unrestrained deforestation. Land cleared for palm oil and timber is often inhabited by human communities, and the powers that be have used their positions to force out people who have been dependent on the forest for generations.

Activist Nicholas Mujah, of SADIA, said two indigenous communities, the Iban and the Melenau, are currently embroiled in land disputes with BLD, and members are being arbitrarily arrested for attempting to protect their crops and prevent further encroachment.

“It’s a hard battle down here because land investment companies are supported by the government and elected representatives politicians at the policy level, while at the ground level, they are protected by gangsters and, in many cases, by police,” he said in an email.

BLD did not respond to multiple requests for comment

A major issue, Mujah said, is that customary lands are usually not legally demarcated.

Since he started compiling court cases in the year 2000, Mujah said indigenous peoples have filed more than 400 lawsuits against companies due to land grievances. And while he said customary communities have come out on top in about 85 per cent of the cases he’s seen, the legal process remains a huge hurdle, with some cases taking up to eight years to be resolved.

“Only international pressure can stifle the arrogant actions of our regime and save the environment,” Mujah said, adding that consumers have a special ability to publicly shame such companies into operating more ethically.

Still, Malaysia’s forestry and agriculture industries remain incredibly lucrative. The forestry sector, fuelled by Malaysia’s extensive tropical tree cover, contributed $5.7 billion to its economy in 2011 and employed 210,000 people.

And then there’s palm oil. Malaysia produces 39 percent of the planet’s palm oil, and 44 per cent of its palm oil exports — numbers made even more impressive given palm oil is a $44 billion dollar industry that is continuously growing.

BLD, for its part, netted a profit of just over $7.6 million in 2014.

These economic realties offer a possible glimpse as to why Adenan, a self-described “amateur naturalist” who openly discusses undertakings such as orangutan conservation, has thus far failed to stem the tide of plantation development in his state, especially by firms like BLD.

“I think the Sarawak government has taken some actions to curb illegal logging, but it’s unclear what the scope of those are, and how much of a long term thing it will create,” said Glenn Hurowtiz, a senior fellow at CIP who also participated in the meeting with the Chief Minister. “I think there were other indications that it was business as usual.“

Though Adenan gave indications that he’s ready to move in a more ecologically sensitive direction, Hurowitz explained such a shift is crucial both in environmental and fiscal terms: More and more major palm oil companies, such Cargill andBunde, have committed to sustainability pledges and are refusing to buy crude palm oil from growers who destroy forests and peatlands.

“I think Sarawak as a state is at risk of losing its market share,” he said.

But given the current state of affairs, with companies like BLD running amok in Malaysia’s forests and public officials showing signs of sitting back at letting it happen, Hurowitz expressed doubt over Adenan’s ability to rein in Sarawak’s bad actors.

“If the Chief Minister won’t even stop a company that’s engaged in as egregious behavior as BLD, it sort of puts into question his ability to fulfill his promises,” he said. “It’s disappointing.”