A renewable Energy and Green Transition Fund has been set up by the government to facilitate the country’s shift to sustainable energy. It will, among other things, be used to provide solar power, irrigation projects, and upgrades to mini-grid systems for small communities that have no electricity, to enhance their livelihoods.
The Deputy Minister of Energy and Green Transition, Mr Richard Gyan-Mensah, who announced this in an address read on his behalf on Friday in Accra at the opening of a two-day international conference, said the fund, established in 2025, would support hundreds of communities. He urged community leaders to engage the Ministry when they have issues with electricity.
The conference was held on the theme, “The Political Economy of Transitions and Inequality in Africa”, organised by the Centre for Social Policy Studies (CSPS) at the University of Ghana and supported by Oxfam, an international non-governmental organisation.
It provided an interdisciplinary platform for scholars, policymakers, and practitioners to interrogate the political economy of energy transitions in Africa. It also afforded participants the opportunity to reflect on how both renewable energy initiatives and critical mineral extraction intersect with broader questions of inequality, inclusion, and development.
Mr Gyan-Mensah emphasised that this forms part of the government’s commitment to long-term solutions, particularly to enhance efficiency and accelerate Ghana’s transition to renewable energy.
“So the government wants to use this fund to support these communities, connect them to mini-grids, provide solar-powered irrigation projects, and implement other initiatives to ensure that we do not leave anyone behind.
“In terms of clean cooking, the government noted that while access to electricity is about 90 per cent, access to clean cooking is still less than 50 per cent. Therefore, the government is working with the Energy Commission to change the narrative,” Mr Gyan-Mensah said.
He added that the government was implementing several reforms and that, to demonstrate commitment, the Ministry’s name has been changed from the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum to the Ministry of Energy and Green Transition.
“So the concept of energy transition, leaving no one behind, is not new to Ghana. In fact, as recently as 15 years ago, the country decided to domesticate its natural gas for power generation. Today, gas is the main source of power generation, along with hydro,” Mr Gyan-Mensah said.
He said, additionally, the Ministry is currently installing solar-powered streetlights nationwide, noting that the existing system for managing streetlights has been inadequate.
A Senior Lecturer and Convenor of the conference, Dr Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai, said Africa was confronted with an inevitable phenomenon: the global transition away from traditional fuels to greener, renewable forms of energy.
“And I mean our continent occupies a paradoxical position in the sense that we contribute less to the problems associated with climate change, yet we are the ones bearing the brunt of its effects,” he said.
BY BERNARD BENGHAN
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