Friends of the Nation received a group of visitors from a German university on February 28, 2014. 20 students and their professor from the Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, Germany, came to visit the socio-environmental NGO in Sekondi to hear about opportunities and challenges of emerging oil countries in the context of globalization.
The German students are enrolled in a Master Program about Geography of globalization. They were accompanied by Peter Lindner, Professor of Economic Geography at the Goethe University, who has been doing research in Ghana for projects over the past five years. On their study trip, they were keen to learn about various sectors of economic development in Ghana, such as oil and gas, and how to sustainably deal with the chances and risks that come along with the discovery of petroleum.
After a short presentation of Program Coordinator Kyei Kwadwo Yamoah from the Natural Resource Management Program Area, the session opened up to a Q&A. The students were interested to learn how Ghana is managing its petroleum revenues, how funds are being utilized and how transparency and public awareness could be promoted. The discussion concluded that Ghana will find itself in a good position if it puts in measures to maximize revenue generations but minimize environmental and social livelihood damage from the oil and gas, as well as some of the money is used to develop the host communities.