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The Ghana Energy Sector Transformation Initiative Project (GESTIP), a World Bank initiative, and the Ministry of Energy organized a stakeholder engagement exercise at the Accra Metropolitan Authority over the weekend.
The purpose of the event, which was attended by a number of organizations from the energy sector, religious groups, civil society organizations, trade associations, and professionals, was to inform participants about some of the achievements made possible by the World Bank-funded GESTIP program through a series of presentations and a discussion section.
The project’s coordinator, Ing James Demitrus, gave a background of the project and mentioned the difficulties that Ghana’s energy sector has faced over the years, including low gas supply, high payments to Independent Power Producers (IPPs) for installed capacity, high distribution losses, and low revenue collections by ECG, among other issues.
“Ghana has implemented a wide range of power sector reforms, including unbundling its power sector and attracting private investment through independent power producers (IPPs) to improve supply of electricity”, he noted.
According to Ing. Demitrus, the goal of GESTIP is to enhance Ghana’s energy sector planning and coordination while fortifying the power sector’s ability to carry out reforms.
As per the project coordinator, 46 consultancy activities have been carried out during the GESTIP’s duration to equip the beneficiary institutions with the necessary knowledge and data to enhance their efficacy and efficiency.
In addition, some of the beneficiary institutions now have the hardware and software tools they need to increase the agencies’ efficiency.
He also revealed that 142 employees in the energy sector had received project management and technical training to increase their ability to carry out the sector’s reforms.
Beneficiaries of the $20m project, which became effective in February 2019 and will close on 31 December 2023, include the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG), Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo), Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC), Energy Commission (EC), Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Northern Electricity Development Company (NEDCO), Volta River Authority (VRA) and the Ministry of Energy.
A similar stakeholder engagement event is slated to take place at the University for Development Studies, Tamale, on Friday 22nd December 2023.
Source: Ghanatodayonline.com
