Courses for inland water transporters opened

The West African Regional Maritime Academy in Tema, Ghana, has introduced a programme to train artisanal fishermen and inland water transporters in basic seamanship, the ‘Daily Graphic’ of Accra reported on Friday. The programme, it said, is to be open to fishermen in other West Africa countries that are members of the academy. Training is expected to “help reduce the alarming rates of marine and inland water disasters”, the newspaper said. Academy principal Captain A.O. Turkson said West Africa had a large number of untrained canoe fishermen and inland water transporters. Ghana alone, he said, had 150,000 marine canoe fishermen who operate 83,000 boats. The academy has long had training courses for deck, engine and refrigeration officers on large deep sea fishing vessels but not for artisanal fishermen.