GHANA – AstraZeneca has announced a partnership with the Circular Bioeconomy Alliance (CBA) and local partners at the Global Forest Summit to establish the first ‘Living Lab’ by planting over 3 million trees in Ghana.
The project is a one-of-a-kind public-private collaboration that combines natural forest restoration, sustainable woodlots, and agroforestry to help improve the local economy while also building community and ecological resilience.
The 10-year community-based project will be implemented in Atebubu and Wiase, Bono East Region in Central Ghana, near Lake Volta and the Digya National Park.
Integrating both traditional knowledge and innovative farming methods, the projects in Atebubu and Wiase place the local communities at the heart of landscape restoration.
In collaboration with local partners and the Circular Bioeconomy Alliance (CBA) AstraZeneca will participate in a community-led project in central Ghana to plant and care for over 3 million trees, including crops such as mangoes and cashews.
The central aim of this community-led project is to plant 4.5 million trees by the end of 2025, with the aim for over 3 million surviving trees, and establish circular business models for local communities.
Restoring 2,500 hectares of dry land
In projects co-designed with local stakeholders, the program will restore 2,500 hectares of dry and savannah forest and demonstrate the benefits of biodiversity regeneration to the local economy, through the creation of local jobs and training programs.
This initiative is a new addition to the AstraZeneca’s Forest program which aims to plant and maintain 50 million trees worldwide by 2025, while making a positive contribution to communities and local economies.
The natural forested land in the Atebubu and Wiase districts in central Ghana has been subject to degradation and habitat change due to heavy encroachment by farmers and tree cutting for charcoal.
As a result, local communities face challenging economic conditions and a deteriorating natural environment.
The Ghanaian tree planting initiative will be part of a global network of ‘Living Labs,’ which aim to demonstrate how investing in nature and putting local communities at the center of landscape restoration can benefit both biodiversity and local livelihoods.
Project planting began in August 2021, with an initial trial of 100,000 trees. Further planting will take place over the next four years, beginning in May this year.
Local partnerships to ensure access to high-quality healthcare
For more than three decades, AstraZeneca has collaborated with stakeholders in Africa to ensure that more patients in Africa have access to high-quality healthcare, from prevention and screening programs to early intervention, treatment, and disease management.
The Africa PUMUA Initiative (breathe), which was launched in 2020, is dedicated to redefining pediatric and adult asthma care in Ghana.
PUMUA focuses on local health system strengthening, health worker capacity building, awareness and education activities, and providing patients with equitable access to AstraZeneca’s respiratory medicines.
The program activated 800 nebulization stations in Kenya, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, and Senegal in 2021.
AstraZeneca’s innovative Healthy Heart Africa (HHA) program aims to combat hypertension and the rising burden of cardiovascular disease (CVD) in Africa.
HHA is present in Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Senegal. Côte d’Ivoire, Uganda, and Ghana, with plans to expand into Rwanda, and had delivered over 23 million screenings cumulatively as of 2021.
Since its inception in Ghana in 2019, HHA has performed over 1.1 million blood pressure screenings in the community and in healthcare facilities.
In addition, the program has trained 179 healthcare workers to provide hypertension education and awareness, screening, and treatment services; and identified over 258,000 elevated blood pressure readings.
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