General News of 2013-03-13

Gutter water for vegetable irrigation

Dirty water from a gutter that meanders through residential areas in parts of Ablekuma South is what some vegetable farmers in the vicinity of Ghana’s premiere healthcare centre, the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, use to water their farms.
Even more alarming is the fact that many households do not have places of convenience, and therefore, attend to the call of nature in major drains or wrap faeces in polythene bags, which eventually find their way into drains in the metropolis.
Some of these vegetables namely; cabbage, carrots, lettuce, pepper, and other useful herbs that hit Accra’s major markets may be coming from these farms, owned and operated by about 140 private farmers.
The practice is, however, not limited to Korle-Bu as other farms at Dzorwulu, Asylum Down, and other suburb use contaminated water to irrigate their vegetable farms.
Unfortunately, these farmers do not see anything wrong with the water they use, arguing that even the chicken drops they use as fertiliser does not affect the quality of vegetables that they produce.
Mohammed Huseine, who has decades of experience in vegetable farming, told the Daily Graphic that during water scarcity periods, they trap the flow of water in gutters, using sand bags.
Others create a pond from which stored water is used to irrigate the farms. Many people have questioned the wholesomeness of vegetables grown in Accra following a report that health authorities could soon be grappling with an epidemic as vegetables in the markets have been found to contain up to 5000 times the permissible levels of chemical residue.
A survey carried out between 2007 and 2008 by the Small Grants Programme of the UNDP/Global Environment Facility (GEF) revealed that vegetables consumed in Accra had more than a dozen chemicals all above tolerable percentages and these have serious health consequences for consumers.
The Country Programme Coordinator of the Small Grants Programme of the UNDP/Global Environment Facility (GEF), Mr George Ortsin, said the phenomenon spelt doom for both human health and the environment, because the cumulative effects of consuming these vegetables over a long period might soon manifest in diverse health problems.
Alarming as this maybe, it is not the only health risk associated with vegetable consumption in Accra. A total of 80 vegetable samples (lettuce, cabbage, and spring onion) were randomly collected under normal purchase conditions from nine major markets and 12 specialised selling points in three major Ghanaian cities: Accra, Kumasi and Tamale.
The samples, according to Mr Amoah in his work ‘Pesticide and Pathogen Contamination of Vegetables in Ghana’s Urban Markets’ were analysed for pesticide residue on lettuce leaves, total and fecal coliforms, and helminth egg counts on all three vegetables.
Chlopyrifos (Dursban) was detected on 78 per cent of the lettuce, lindane (Gamalin 20) three per cent, endosulfan (Thiodan) 36 per cent, lambda-cyhalothrin (Karate) 11 per cent, and dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane 33 per cent.
According to Mr Amoah, most of the residues recorded exceeded the maximum residue limit for consumption.
“Vegetables from all three cities were fecally contaminated and carried fecal coliform populations. Because many vegetables are consumed fresh or slightly cooked, the study shows that intensive vegetable production, common in Ghana and its neighbouring countries, threatens public health from the microbiologic and pesticide dimensions”, the report stated,
Vegetables have enormous health benefits. They provide the body with vitamins and the fibre needed to fight cancer, stroke, heart diseases and type-2 diabetes.
Despite these benefits, some people, including medical doctors, have decided not to eat the ‘colours’ of greens (cabbage, cucumber, green pepper, green beans etc), and orange (carrots), at least not when they are in Accra.
The Accra Metropolitan Public Health Department has indicated that eating contaminated vegetables can lead to the contraction of typhoid fever, diarrhoea, cholera, and hepatitis A.
The Director of the department, Dr Simpson Anim Boateng, in an interview with the Daily Graphic attributed the recurrent outbreak of cholera to some of these practices, which he described as unhealthy.
Statistics are not available but it is believed that many livelihoods depend on urban vegetable farming, and a ban would, therefore, create economic hardships for such families.
The way forward, according to Dr Boateng, is to provide alternative water supply such as a borehole for these farmers.