re: heat

In my efforts to identify how miners in Talensi-Nabdam can go about improving their livelihoods, I have overlooked one crucial element: the weather. The heat in the Upper East Region is oppressive; it is cruel; it is enough to turn any carefully-sketched plan to generate economic growth, developed in the office or abroad, into wastepaper. I wake up in the morning, and do not want to move from under my fan.

As I prepare my questions for the the NGO people I will be interviewing tomorrow about the child labour project they have launched in the mining regions of Talensi-Nabdam, I cannot stop thinking about the heat. I mean, we talk of alternative livelihoods but what can you possibly do here? In 40 degree, dry weather, farming prospects are limited. There are also very few vocational training programs in place. After all, you can only have so many teachers and policemen in one area.

The only solution is to forge ahead and support the gold mining operations that have surfaced in the area over the past 10 years. After all, it is an employment engine and certainly a blessing in these parts. This is something that the government claims it is working toward - something which I intend on investigating over the next few weeks.

Most of the mining operations up here, however, are dormant. In what is a cruel twist of irony, a surplus of water prevents these people from operating: they lack pumps. In addition to being scortching hot for much of the year, the Upper East Region experiences a series of heavy downpours - and I mean downpours - every summer, which make up its rainy season. The water that accumulates in the mine pits inhibits activity: miners cannot afford the pumps needed to remove the water.

So here we are, sitting in what is dry land, virtually devoid of vegetation but sitting on a gold mine. Yet, people are unable to work because, of all things, water.

Sometimes, you find yourself lost for words.