During the bilateral conference, the Ghanaian students talked about the impacts of climate change in Ghana. Through doing the conference, I learned a bit about the environmental, economic, and social implications of climate change in Ghana, and was able to compare and contrast those ideas with what I know about climate change in Canada. 

One thing that surprised me was that despite living almost 11,000 km apart, the issues Ghana and Canada face due to climate change are similar in many ways. Although Canada has 4 seasons (summer, fall, winter and spring) and Ghana has 2 (wet and dry), global warming is causing changes in the seasons for both of us. For Canada, this means shorter/warmer winters and longer/hotter summers, and for Ghana this means less, and more unpredictable, rainfall during the wet season. In addition to that, the spread of disease was another common thread that I noticed during the conference. Here in Canada, our warmer weather is leading to an increase in tick populations, thus encouraging the transmission of Lyme disease. A similar idea is being seen in Ghana, where increased rainfall and flooding has caused diseases like Malaria, Cholera, and Typhoid to become more prevalent. One impact that the Ghanaian students mentioned, that we do not see in Canada, is erosion of things such as roads and infrastructure. I think this issue doesn’t impact Canada very much as we are a developed country, and our roads and infrastructure can handle the changes that climate change is bringing. On the other hand, Ghana is developing and doesn’t have the resources to implement the improved infrastructure that it needs, thus leading to these problems. An impact that we discussed, that the Ghanaian students didn’t, is rising sea temperatures. In Canada, rising sea temperatures is having a negative impact on our fish and thus harming our Indigenous communities and fishing industry. That being said, the students from Ghana did not touch on the issue of rising sea temperatures at all. I think this is because they live near the equator and therefore are accustomed to the warm sea temperatures. The organisms in their rivers, and bodies of water, are likely adapted to warm water, and thus don’t feel the impacts of rising sea temperatures as much as the organisms in Canada’s river systems (as they are adapted to cold water). Overall, I thought it was interesting to hear how climate change impacts the students in Ghana, and was intrigued by how similar a lot of their impacts were to those we see in Canada. That being said, because our countries are so different, there were undoubtedly a lot of impacts that are unique to each country.

In terms of challenges, as mentioned above, a lot of the case studies we discussed were relatively similar, thus having similar impacts on our countries and causing similar challenges. The increased spread of disease is impacting health in our countries, the warmer and dryer conditions are causing more wildfires (thus impacting the environment), the change in rainfall, sea temperature, and overall weather conditions are impacting our economies, and overall, these things are impacting the people. Whether it’s less fish for Indigenous communities in Canada, or not being able to go to school because of a low crop yield in Ghana, climate change is introducing so many challenges for everyone.

As disheartening as they may be, I really enjoyed talking about these challenges with the students from Ghana and learning about their country. Sometimes we get so involved in our own bubble, that we forget that there’s other people out there who are experiencing the same things as us, just in a different way. Remembering that we are in it together, and seeing all the things that the Ghanaian and Canadian government are doing to combat climate change, helped lift my spirits a little bit. It’ll be interesting to see what happens moving forward.

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