Happy Farmers’ Day Greetings to Our Farmers and Consumers
I am compelled to send these greetings to our brave farmers and consumers who have made it possible for us to have food on the table whenever we are hungry. This is not a usual greeting, but one that raises concerns about the future of farmers and consumers.
I wonder what farming will become in the next fifty years if we fail to educate farmers and consumers on a strong Climate Change campaign, which will inform the types of foods grown and the need for consumers to adapt their tastes to reflect the new era we are entering, without the possibility of choices.
I have encountered several Climate Change campaigns in the past, most of which were excellent, but with one shortcoming: the lack of properly educating citizens about climate change before launching elaborate campaigns about how to grow this or that food for greater harvests and benefits.
The best place to start climate change education is not with the farmers and their labourers, but with students who will be our future leaders tomorrow.
Let’s closely examine how these measures can be implemented to benefit Ghanaians.
Primary School Education
As a self-proclaimed climate change activist, I believe climate change education must commence right from primary schools.
The curriculum should include climate change news, reasons for dams to irrigate farms, learning about new crops resistance to infections, and more.
Junior and Senior High School Education
Students will continue with more detailed lessons as they progress to JHS and SHS, where they will be taught several complex issues related to climate change — from food production and the need to adjust our tastes to meet new crop production demands, to changes in fashion since most of our clothes derive from plants and animals.
University Education
University students are not exempt from compulsory climate change courses, which prepare them for green jobs, green entrepreneurship, green economy, and other complex climate-related issues.
This education, from primary through to university ensures individuals are better prepared to understand any climate change project presented to them.
Asking a farmer who has cultivated a particular crop variety for decades to suddenly switch to a new one because it is better and benefits others would not make sense if he had undergone different levels of climate change education to prepare him in advance.
In conclusion, I call on the government, the Minister of Education, NGOs partnering with the government, and other stakeholders to urgently implement or integrate climate change education into our curriculum if we are to have any chance of addressing climate change issues, instead of delivering impressive speeches that generate headlines, but little concrete action.
Christopher Klove
Author of The Search for the Green Planet, a climate change book that introduces climate change education to JHS, SHS and people who have an interest in climate change and the environment.
You can also purchase a copy on Amazon Kindle
This article is timely and emphasising the need to consolidate into climate changes topics isolated and subsumed in various subjects and course at various levels of our education. There is the need to place emphasis and commitment to the climate changes rhetorics.