A capacity development workshop for WASH Journalist opened in Accra on Tuesday with a call on journalist and the public to adopt a holistic approach towards environmental and water management.

Dr Emmanuel Tachie-Obeng, Senior Programme Officer, at the Environmental Protection Agency, addressing participants at the workshop called on journalist to report water issues holistically as it is life and accord it the needed attention.

He said clean water was scarce and its well-being had been reduced, both in terms of management and improvement.

He noted that water management was a human right, and that, the right to it was an adequate standard of living.

“You need water as a basic thing, and every home needs to protect water, and it should be available since it’s a needed security to lives, the environment and country at large”, he said.

Dr Tachie-Obeng, however observed that water needed to be at the centre of all policy formulations and called for a concerted effort amongst all stakeholders to help manage water efficiently in the country, as water is regarded as an essential commodity for a country’s development.

“Let us manage our water and lands for productive growth especially in this era of climate change”, he said

He called for infrastructure, resources, strong institutions, capacities and investments towards the management of water adequately in the country.

Mr Maxwell Boateng-Gyimah, the Chief Executive Officer of Ghana Country Water Partnership (G-CWP) explained that the workshop aimed at educating and sensitizing journalist on how best to report on water issues in Ghana.

“It also aims at helping journalist to know how best to package and disseminate information on ways of implementing and formulating policies for water issues in Ghana”, he said.

Organized by G-CWP, in partnership with the Ghana WASH Journalists Network, Mr Boateng-Gyimah noted that, the periodic workshop also sought to broaden the knowledge, scope and ideas of journalist on water and climate change in the country.

He said for climate change and water to be an in-depth subject for the understanding of journalist and the public they inform, there was the need for an advocacy aimed at improving mechanism for addressing the issues.

He stressed that when much importance is accorded to water and climate change, journalist would know how best to project their stories, using the right words, techniques among others which would go a long way of promoting their reportage to the public.

Professor Kwame Karikari, Lecturer at the University of Ghana, School of Communication, lauded G-CWP for the initiative, saying, it was a refresher programme that would help journalist to understand the basic concepts and the knowledge of the subject matter in order to get basic answers for the country’s development.

The three-day workshop brought together journalist and other stakeholders all over the country to discuss, share and adopt new approaches of learning new ways of improving journalists writing skills on water reportage.