@FAOGhana/David Youngs

Supporting national efforts to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals 1 (No Poverty) and 2 (Zero Hunger)

Ghanaian government leaders and managers, including directors and technicians from a multidisciplinary range of Ministries have successfully completed the Executive Programme (EP),”Strengthening the use of poverty analysis to achieve SDGs 1 and 2,” in support of national efforts to achieve shared prosperity and the SDG Agenda.

The participants are part of a total of twenty-six government officials and managers from Zambia and Ghana participating in the training organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), in partnership with the International Policy Center for Inclusive Growth (IPC_IG) and the International Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), in the latter part of 2019.

In the closing ceremony convened by the Government focal point to the Programme, the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC), handed certificates to those who completed all three phases of the Executive Programme.

FAO Deputy Regional Representative for Africa and Officer in Charge of the FAO office in Ghana Jocelyn Brown Hall reiterated FAO’s commitment to supporting countries in meeting the SDG agenda. Brown Hall said FAO's strategic framework tackles the root causes of poverty and hunger, building  more inclusive growth and development, and leaving no one behind. “This Executive Programme aiming at strengthening capacities on poverty analysis is a good example of such collaboration and support,” she added.

Working towards achieving SDG 1 and 2

This initiative is hosted under FAO’s Strategic Programme 3 “Reduce Rural Poverty” as part of its efforts to effectively support countries in achieving the SDGs by adopting multi-sectoral approaches to poverty reduction, emphasizing the interdependence and linkages between poverty, food security and nutrition.

Despite the remarkable achievements of Ghana in meeting the 2015 Millennium Development Goals targets of halving extreme poverty and halving the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water, and in achieving the goals relating to universal primary education and gender parity in primary school by 2015, there are still 2.4 million extreme poor in Ghana and inequality is on the rise.

The rural poor face particularly acute challenges, including fragile and degrading natural resources, limited access to markets, finance, social services, improved technologies and infrastructure.

Senior Rural Sociologist and focal point for the Rural Poverty Reduction Programme for Africa, Pamela Pozarny stated that the course strengthens governments’ capacity to address the complexities of poverty, by applying the concepts, principles and good practices gained within their

own spheres of work, particularly by working through multi-sector linkages. She also announced that the Phase 1 eLearning course will be soon be open for public access on socialprotection.org in late March. She also commended participants for their commitment and vision during the Phase 3 coaching phase, which was a follow-up to the development of action plans during the Phase workshop held in Akosombo in October 2019.

Geoffrey Gargar, Programme participant from the Ministry of Finance, thanked FAO and its partners for this very useful and relevant initiative, and highlighted the added value of having a two country approach whereby the exchange of experiences with Zambian participants was enabled profiting from varying perspectives throughout the learning process.