Kumasi, Jan 30, GNA - Mr Matthew Dally, International Labour Organisation (ILO) Co-ordinator in-charge of West and Central Africa, has urged media practitioners to be more conversant with human trafficking and labour issues in Ghana.

This, he said, would help to sensitise the public on the dangers of such problems and arrest them in society.

Mr Dally was speaking at a day's workshop organised by the Social Research Associates (SRA), research and management consultants, and the Defence for Children International (DCI) Ghana, an NGO.

The workshop, organised for 27 media practitioners in Kumasi, aimed at equipping them with skills and expertise to help educate the public to minimize human trafficking and child labour in the country. Mr Dally said the ILO, in collaboration with the government, had made a lot of interventions to create the awareness about the dangers and the need to curb the menace.

He said in the promulgation of Child Trafficking Act 605 by the government, coupled with ILO conventions on child trafficking, it was expected that such problems would be reduced to the barest minimum. He announced that 10 communities in the Kumasi metropolis have benefited from child trafficking project being implemented by the DCI and the SRA and funded by the ILO.

The communities are Aboabo, Bantama Race Course, Adum, Buokrom, Asafo, Asawasi and Fanti New Town. Dr Slyvester Kwakye, Executive Director of the SRA, said arrangements were far advanced to form vigilante committees, as well as child rights clubs in schools to sensitise the communities against such practices.