I’m sitting at the Engineers Without Borders volunteer training house in Toronto. Today was the second official day of my 6-day pre-departure training; this Saturday our batch of 22 volunteers including myself will fly out for Ghana and Burkina Faso respectively. The last two days have been over-13-hour days of intense seminars, workshops, case studies, and learning… and it’ll only get more challenging as the week goes on! I’ll throw up a post later this week with some highlights from training, but for now I figure it’s about time I shared with all of you what I’m going to be working on in Ghana.
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EWB is working with the officials in district government offices in Ghana to support planning for infrastructure that is based on evidence. This way, critical public services such as clean water, education, and health services get to the communities that need it most urgently, and where they serve the most people. I can describe how I relate to this work with a short thought: while I in Canada sit comfortably on a computer typing this, I know there are people in Ghana who’ve never had the privilege of free education or services like Wikipedia. I know that if something even minor happened to me right now ambulances would be on the scene in 3 minutes and I’d be taken care of, while a pregnant woman suffering complications in Saboba (the community in Ghana I’ll be working in) must travel 50 km to the nearest health clinic. These are not unsolvable problems, and they can be solved, locally… with a little push.
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I’m going to be working as part of EWB’s Governance and Rural Infrastructure team (GaRI) in the Northern region of Ghana. 80% of the 2 million people in this region earn less than $1.25 a day, and most are small-holder farmers that grow crops to earn a living. Electricity is sparse, communication (especially internet) is difficult to come by, and the roads are gravel and get washed away by the rains every year. And the weather: hot-and-dry for half the year, and hot-and-wet for the other half. Fully tropical.
Like I mentioned I’ll be working at the district level of government in a district called Saboba (circled). It’s right on the border with Togo, and has a population of about 100,000 people.
My official job: to work with district officers and the District Coordination and Planning Unit to encourage the use of data in infrastructure planning processes. This means decisions being made on information and data, rather than political whims and “guessing.” Another part of my job will be to explore communication between departments such as Ghana Education Services, Water/Sanitation, and Ghana Health. Lastly, I’ll be looking into systems that ensure districts follow through with their plans, and public services get to those who needed it the most.
My key thoughts right now: What are the attitudes like of the people working at the district office? I know that culturally, people in Ghana have a much stronger view of authority than we do; but how can we work with that while at the same time encouraging them to push back against bad decisions? What motivates the people – leaders and officers – in the government? Is it just getting paid, doing their job, gaining power, serving their community…?
My unofficial job: to understand, learn, and connect with the culture, language(s), and people of Ghana. To build trust, and strong connections, and provide whatever support I can to help people achieve their goals (this can be technical assistance, knowledge, motivation, and more). To explore what poverty is, what development is, and gain an idea of what rural living is like. To connect my friends, family, colleagues, and EWB members at U of T directly to my work in Ghana; to help them all gain a better understanding of why I’m doing what I am, and what the realities of poverty look like in a specific context.
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Extra Information: (click here for more about Ghana!)
Until the late 1980′s, all of Ghana’s governance and public services were managed from its capital city, Accra. Over the last couple of decades, though, the Ghanaian government has been moving away from this “centralized” system of governance so that more decision-making power would lie closer to the people, at the districts. It makes sense; every region has different priorities and needs, and the capital of a country over 800 km across can’t possibly do an efficient job of managing services.
Ghana is divided (based on population density) into ~140 districts across 10 regions. This gives way to three levels of government: National, Regional, and District. The idea around decentralization is that district assemblies would plan and implement public services in their districts, the national government would set the direction for specific things (education, health, water & sanitation, etc) and the regional government would monitor the districts for progress.
On paper this sounds great, but in practice it’s a little more complicated. A lot of funding money in Ghanaian districts are from donors (ie. World Bank, UNICEF) whose requirements and restrictions must be met. There is political corruption, like everywhere, but no systems that limit the power of leadership. Nobody knows who is responsible for particular services, as the national government departments play power-tug-of-war with the districts. Thus due to complex political and donor relationships, real decision-making power is not always where it should be.
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Not-Extra Information:
That’s all for now! Stay tuned for (much) more very very soon. In the meantime, read what I’ve written, pick out things that aren’t explained clearly, and comment! Ask me questions, and we’ll all learn something together.
Before I leave I’ll put up another pre-departure post about some of the things I’ve been working on in training. FIVE DAYS TILL I FLY OUT!!!
