The Ministry of Local Government Decentralisation, and Rural Development (MLGDRD) under the Ghana Urban Mobility and Accessibility Project (GUMAP) with support from the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) is pleased to announce an upcoming Household Travel Survey (HTS). This is a unique effort to gather comprehensive data on travel patterns, behaviours, and transportation demands of residents of the Greater Accra Metropolitan Area (GAMA), to inform transport planning and management.

This survey is set to contribute to the development of a sustainable and efficient transportation system that meets the needs of residents of GAMA.

The survey is scheduled to commence on [Monday 24^th July 2023] and continue to [Saturday 30^th September 2023], the HTS aims to collect information to understand how households move within and between communities as well as identify the factors influencing their travel choices.  The enumerators for the HTS will employ standard data collection methodologies to gather the data, ensuring statistical accuracy and confidentiality of respondents.

The survey will encompass a representative sample of 7500 households from various Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies (MMAs) in GAMA, considering urban, and sub-urban areas by examining travel patterns among residence across diverse communities. It will also provide crucial insights into the experiences of different households with regards to transport choices and trip satisfaction by helping policymakers develop efficient transportation strategies that cater for the unique needs of each MMA.

During the survey period, officially assigned and well identified enumerators will visit selected households across twenty-nine (29) MMAs in GAMA to administer questionnaires that comprehensively capture travel-related information. The questionnaire will cover topics such as travel mode preferences (trotro or private), trip duration, purpose of travel, frequency of travel, commuting habits, access to transportation options, and challenges faced during travel.

The MMAs include Accra metro, Tema Metro, Ga West, La Nkwantanang Madina, Ga Central, Ga East, Ga South, Tema West, Ashiaman, Kpone Katamanso, Ledzokuku, Krowor, Korley Klottey, La Dade-Kotopon , Ayawaso North, Ayawaso East, Ayawaso Central, Okaikwei North, Adentan, Ayawaso West, Ga North, Ablekuma Central, Ablekuma West, Ablekuma North, Weija-Gbawe, Gomoa East, Nsawam Adoagyiri, Awutu Senya East and Ningo Prampram District Assembly.

The Ministry has sworn in a twelve-member Ministerial Advisory Board as per Article 39 of the Civil Service Act, 1993 of the PNDC law 327, which charges all Ministries to establish a Ministerial Advisory Board to advise the Ministry on relevant policy issues.

The Ministerial Advisory Board will constantly interact with the Ministry and advise the Minister on adjustments in policy directions, plan objectives, and operational strategies.

 Hon. Daniel Botwe, the Minister, swore in the members noting that the technical capacity and expertise of the Board members will help the Ministry achieve its goals as a policy institution.

He emphasised that the Ministry's objective is to bring governance to the doorsteps of the people as stipulated in Chapter 20 of the 1992 Constitution.

He reminded the members to focus on helping the Ministry deepen local governance and decentralisation to achieve balance and equitable development.

The Board has the sector Minister as the Chair, with the Minister of State, Hon. Osei Bonsu Amoah, Hon. Colins Augustine Ntim, and Hon. Martin Adjei- Mensah Korsah, both Deputy Ministers of the Ministry, as members of the Board.

The Chief Director of the Ministry, Alhaji Amin Abdul-Rahaman, Prof Kwasi Adarkwa, Dr. Esther Ofei Aboagye, Hon. Dennis Aboagye, Dr. Nana Ato Arthur, Prof. Nicholas Awortwi, Ms. Florence Ayisi Quartey, Eric Tetteh-Addison and a representative from Parliamentary Select Committee on Local Government also as members.

A Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development, Mr. Martin Adjei Mensah Korsah has called on residents of Accra to change their behaviour towards waste disposal and make conscious choices regarding their building sites to help reduce the perennial flooding in the national capital.  

Mr. Korsah made the appeal during an inspection tour of the beneficiary Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies (MMAs) of the Greater Accra Resilient and Integrated Development (GARID) Project to assess the progress of ongoing desilting works and community engagements in the respective Assemblies.

The Deputy Minister said his Ministry has so far disbursed One Million Three Hundred Dollars ($1, 300,000) out of the over Three Million Dollars ($3,250,000) earmarked for disbursement to the Seventeen (17) GARID project beneficiary Assemblies to use for desilting of local drains and other drainage improvement works. He, however, observed that the huge investments of Government in flood control programmes are being undermined by inappropriate behaviour of some residents of Accra who engage in constructing buildings in waterways, and indiscriminate dumping of solid wastes which find their ways into drains in the city.

Mr. Korsah said the implementation of the GARID Project’s interventions, and all other Government’s flood mitigation measures will not succeed if such inappropriate behaviour and underlying attitudes do not change, noting that “For flood mitigation to succeed, citizens must change their behaviour. Our prospects as a city are grim if people do not change their attitudes towards solid waste management and their choices of building sites.”

The GARID Project Coordinator, Dr. Kwadwo Ohene Sarfoh, called on all stakeholders to support government efforts in finding lasting solutions to flooding and solid waste management challenges in Accra. He said Government alone cannot solve the sanitation and flooding problems in the country; it must be a shared responsibility. “Our flood control programmes in the city can only yield the desired results, if residents of Accra change their behavior; the Assemblies enforce the sanitation and building regulations; and the media help in sensitizing citizens to adopt the appropriate solid waste management and flood mitigation measures,” Dr. Ohene explained. 

The inspection tour took the Deputy Minister to major flood hotspots in the 17 beneficiary GARID Project Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies where desilting works were being carried out. He expressed satisfaction about progress of work and commended the Assemblies for their dedication in executing the task.

The GARID Project is Government of Ghana Project being implemented with credit facility from the World Bank. The Project aims at addressing flooding in Odaw Basin of Greater Accra Region and focuses on improving drainage, solid waste management and provision of services and infrastructure in priority flood prone informal settlements within the basin.