Over the past week, Meridian Port Services (MPS) demonstrated a commitment to
help fight plastic pollution as persons, governments, businesses and organisations
globally marked World Environment Day.
Together with state authorities within the Port Community including the Ghana Ports
and Harbours Authority, the Ghana Maritime Authority, the Environmental Protection
Agency, the Tema Metropolitan Assembly, MPS started off the celebration with a
sensitization exercise to educate workers at the Terminal 3 on the responsible use and
disposal of plastics.
The workers at the port were encouraged to begin the segregation of waste at their homes and the workplace.
Local waste management authorities were also encouraged to begin to consider recycling plastics as not only is it an environmental initiative but an economic one.
MPS that day, also played host to the Marine Pollution Technical Committee to discuss
marine pollution around the Tema port enclave and Tema coastline, address
institutional gaps and interventions, as well as strategize to implement the action plan to
fight the situation.
The committee consists of stakeholders from the maritime sector as well as the
adjoining districts which include the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, Meridian Port
Services, Ghana Maritime Authority, Tema Shipyard, Association of Ghana
Industries, Environmental Protection Agency, Eastern Naval Base, Marine Police Unit
of the Ghana Police Service, Tema Traditional Council, Tema West Municipal
Assembly, Kpong Katamanso Municipal Assembly (KKMA) and selected heads of
departments and units from the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA).
At the storm drain around the Terminal 3 of the Tema Port, a Snr. Environmental
Specialist, MPS Henry A. Okine called on adjoining communities to the port to end the
indiscriminate disposal of waste.
“Most of these rubbish coming in are plastic waste and it is quite alarming. Besides
plastic waste, we have faecal matter also coming through. In a year we spend over 300,000 Ghana cedis to keep the V-drain clean. We have some of our cleaners who do the job for us but that is not sustainable. What is sustainable is, people need to change their behaviour of improper waste disposal. I want to call on the community out there. We all need to be educated and also change our ways of improper waste disposal,” he said in an interview with Eye on Port.







