Vodafone Ghana ignoring calls to restore internet to Bolgatanga

I'm posting from mobile since we still have no internet. Despite repeated requests for Vodafone Bolgatanga to restore a full, stable connection to our town, and Vodafone Accra's assurances that it already IS fixed...it's not fixed. Unless "fixed" means 1 hour in 5 minute snatches per day while Vodafone continues to charge monthly fees to cafes thatnow have no customers 23 hours a day. Net cafes are going broke in Bolga. Is this happening anywhere else in Ghana? When will Vodafone fix the connection?

Making Sense of Oil Discoveries in Ghana: Part 2, a dispute with the Ivory Coast?

In Sunday’s post Making Sense of Oil Discoveries in Ghana: Part 1, I explained the oil exploration industry basics. And in my very first post on the subject, Making Sense of Ghana's Oil Discoveries: Introduction, I referred to the potentially problematic border issue:

“It gets quite complicated when the field also happens to sit in disputed areas like major gas fields between Australia and East Timor.

Australia and Indonesia jointly determined maritime boundaries between the two countries after Indonesia invaded East Timor. These boundaries favoured certain gas finds to Australia, but when East Timor gained independence from Indonesia, East Timor disputed the legality of the boundaries that Australia created with Indonesia during the illegal occupation. The boundaries deprived newly independent East Timor of revenue.

East Timor argued that the boundaries did not accord with international law. East Timor argued that they should have more share of the royalties from the development of the field. This dispute went on for years (we had an annual conference and every year they said the agreement would be finalized that year…it was, five years later) and eventually a complicated revenue sharing agreement was finalized between the countries and those companies with interests in developing the field. It was very interesting.

At least, in Ghana’s case, there are no border disputes where the blocks lay on the border with the Ivory Coast.”

I wrote.

And then, later that very day, I read: Ivory Coast Oil Claim has serious implications at My Joyonline by Fiifi Koomson.

What what what what what what what?!

So, I decided to create a separate post addressing this as simply as possible. I have included edited excerpts of Fiifi Koomson’s story here that explains the gist of the issue.

“Lands and Natural Resources Minister says the emerging claim from Ivory Coast to portions of the oil fields in the Western Region is a very delicate matter. Collins Dauda said the issue has serious international and diplomatic repercussions. Government is expecting Parliament to quickly deliberate on a bill that would establish a boundary commission to negotiate Ghana’s maritime boundaries with Ivory Coast.”

“We have not been able, as a country, to determine our boundary with Ivory Coast and there is the need for us to now determine the maritime boundary between Ghana and Ivory Coast,” he said.

All I can think is Now?

"Mr Dauda however said both countries have, for years, respected “a median line” between them that cannot be trespassed."

Respect is lovely when there’s nothing at stake. I have to say that “median line” featured heavily in discussions between Australia and East Timor.

“All of a sudden, with the oil find, Ivory Coast is making a claim that is disrespecting this median line we have all respected. In which case we would be affected or the oil find will be affected,” he said.

Who is surprised?

”Collins Dauda said, last year, Ghana appealed to the United Nations to extend its maritime boundary by 200 nautical miles.”

I think he means that the appeal was made last year. Last year?! (Mama Mia!)

”Head of Research at the Kofi Annan International Peace Keeping Training Centre, Dr Kwesi Aning, says the latest turn of events exemplifies “a failure of the state institutions to protect our national interest.”

An (unfortunately) astute observation.

”Dr Aning said there is a general lack of seriousness in ensuring the country’s boundaries are protected. The security expert is recommending a solid technical documentation studied by lawyers with expertise in petroleum issues.”

Hopefully this can be resolved faster than Australia and East Timor could resolve their differences. It should be simpler as the issues in this case are less complex (not relating to agreements with a former invading nation, for starters), but rather between amicable neighbours. But they certainly need experienced, honest and independent experts to advise. If not, I won’t be the only person in Ghana throwing my hands in the air and cursing about lost opportunities.

In Honour of Wangari Maathai on International Women’s Day for Ghana

I remember being in Vietnam in late 2006 for Vietnamese Women’s Day and then in March 2007 for International Women’s Day. The timing was a coincidence. On the first occasion I was invited to a lunch with our partner organisation during which they honoured about a dozen of their Vietnamese female staff (and two of us expats) with bunches of flowers and a feast of excellent cuisine at a traditional restaurant. It was a fun afternoon with excellent food and company. In March, I was then in the middle of a training workshop in which the participants also surprised us with flowers in honour of International Women’s Day (click the link to see what happens in Vietnam); I was so busy I didn’t even realise what day it was and I was certainly not expecting another celebration.

I observed that Vietnam, even in that provincial area, was on its way to achieving gender equality at least in the home. On that second occasion the men explained how they shared the cooking, looked after the children and helped with the household chores like washing and cleaning—and the consequences if they didn’t. Vietnamese are extremely industrious (if they were the size of China, China would be looking over its own shoulder with great concern), so it shouldn’t have been too surprising to learn that the same culture prevailed in the home. I’ve no doubt that this industriousness and the sharing of the household burden are fundamental keys to Vietnam’s development success. A nation simply can’t develop when 50% of its population are given special treatment and the other 50% have to shoulder the burden of work inside and outside the house and are not given equal opportunity academically or professionally.

Ghanaians say “Wishes are not horses”. It essentially means that wishful thinking gets you nowhere. Nevertheless, I’m going to make a wish.

I wish that Ghanaian women were treated as well as their Vietnamese counterparts in the home, if not the work place too. Better still, I wish that Vietnamese and Ghanaian women were treated as well as, say, their Swedish counterparts.

I wish every woman and man on earth, but particularly Ghanaian women, could read Wangari Maathai’s “Unbowed”.

I often make silly lists of Top 10 this and that, but if someone asked me to name one book that everyone should read (or have read to them), Unbowed is it. If you never read again, read Unbowed.

I knew I was on to a good thing when two of my favourite authors had given front and back cover endorsements for the book: Bill Clinton (the former President), whose “My Life” is one of my favourite autobiographies, and Alexandra Fuller who wrote “Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight”. You should add both of these to your “to read” lists too. Clinton’s is an epic masterpiece of autobiographical writing that takes you on a remarkable journey of which US politics is just a part. Fuller drops you in the front row of racist, pre- and post-colonial, southern Africa on a journey that unashamedly forces you to experience that past from her unique, child-voice point-of-view.

But back to Maathai.

Wangari Maathai must be the greatest living inspiration for African women today. Ghanaian women, who are in a better position to speak out for oppressed women across Africa and, importantly, within Ghana itself, ought to “take a leaf” (no pun intended) from her life, her work, her determination and courage.

Indeed, where is Ghana’s Wangari Maathai? Does such a woman exist? Is she quietly working behind the scenes, yet to come to the media’s attention?

In a country in which it is exceedingly less threatening to speak one’s mind than anywhere else in Africa aside from (perhaps) Botswana, where are women taking action against unequal practices in the home, in the public sphere, and with environmental issues?

Where is the movement of women encompassing all women across Ghana, urban and rural?

Looking around me here in the Upper East Region, where conditions are harsh, hot, unforgiving and designed to make life as difficult as possible, and women toil in the home and fields for virtually nothing—certainly not property rights when their husband dies, and not for money while they’re living—why is there not a greater call for change?

While I think Gifty Anti does a great job on GTV hosting a program that discusses women’s issues, in particular, with a panel or women and men each week, it only goes so far.

Maathai is well known for winning the Nobel Peace prize in 2004 and for her Greenbelt Movement which, since 1977, has planted more than 40 million trees across Africa. 

But this is half the story. She transformed not just the geographical landscape, but the human landscape in Kenya, too. Her will and her network prevented or remedied human rights abuses, corrupt practices, destructive environmental practices, and conflict across Kenya—in the face of death threats, abuse, harassment and much more. Every struggling nation needs their Maathai. If they don’t have one, they can take inspiration from Africa’s Maathai.

The planet is going to the dogs. Ghana is certainly not helping. Deforestation is a terrible problem in this country. According to Oxfam, only 25% of Ghana’s total original tropical rainforest remains. When I visited Wli in 2005 the mountains had some forest cover, yet logging was taking place one metre outside the “protected area”. When I visited in 2007 I woke to the sound of chainsaws in the forest nearby. All day: chainsaws. Chainsaws for the next five days. The mountains, while majestic in form, looked more like something out of Lord of the Rings—Saruman’s burning, not the Ents—than what I experienced two years earlier. Does Ghana want to become another Burkina Faso or Mali? An extension of the Sahara Desert?

Timber is Ghana’s third largest export after cocoa and minerals. Timber is also cleared for planting cash crops. The Government apparently banned exports of raw logs, but what about slightly processed logs? And whose needs are being catered for in the income generated from this business? 16% of the land cover has been set aside for forest and nature reserves. That means, and 9% of forests are still open for logging. These were Oxfam statistics. According to Stephen Yeboah on ghanaweb.com, the BBC estimates that Ghana has lost 90% of forest cover since independence in 1957. Either way, Ghana is on the fast-track to desertification.

This is not a criticism of Ghana as a country, but rather an observation of what feels like many missed opportunities. In a country where one can speak fairly freely, why is Ghana not leading the way for change for women in Africa? And who is going to speak up for the environment? If one woman caught in an oppressive regime can speak up, why don’t women speak out more in Ghana? Or am I being naïve? Or has complacency set in?

Or is the “PhD” mentality too overwhelming? That is, the “pull him down” thinking that prevails in Ghana that one should only reach a certain “status” before one is "pulled back down to earth where one belongs"? Why should one not reach greatness? Who are you not to achieve greatness, to stand up for other less fortunate people, and to protect your children’s natural assets?

Incidentally, the same mentality is alive and well in Australia, particularly for women, so I understand. It’s called the “Tall Poppy Syndrome”. A poppy is a type of flower that grows on a long stem with a pretty, bright flower on top. The saying goes that if you become too much of a “tall poppy”, someone will “cut you down” to “where you belong”. When an Australian at home, but especially living abroad, achieves some level of success, they’ll often be criticized by the Australian media. Various actors, writers and activists living abroad have experienced this. Female politicians still suffer from this, as do academics and other professionals.

None of us should repress our talents, skills, aspirations or our rights just because society deems it or someone else says so. Society is not a piece of granite; society is fluid like the water that falls in Wli. Even if you threw a stone into the pool beneath the hurtling falls, the ripples would be felt. And the “someone else’s” are simply mortals who will one day turn to dust.

In a country that’s already struggling to meet its citizen’s basic needs, the solution for societal and environmental change, it seems to me, is an alliance of strength and courage. Women, I’ve observed especially in rural Ghana, are nothing if not strong and courageous. And, like in Maathai’s story, it only takes one strong woman to speak out and take action. Authenticity and passion are obvious when you experience these traits. As such, Maathai has the support of wise and intelligent men these days both within and outside Kenya, as well as her women sisters.

There’s a saying that one doesn’t regret what one did, but what one didn’t do.

If you’re not sure what to do next, read Wangari Maathai’s Unbowed. It’s for sale in the Silverbird book shop in Accra Mall for GHC 17.90. Share it with your friends and read it to them if they can’t read. Once you’ve read it, pass it one and the rest will follow.

Feel free to add your thoughts and ideas here and thank you for reading.

And, most of all, thank you to Wangari Maathai for the inspiration and the ideas, now and in future.

The photo at the top is from the International Women's Day site. The image of the book cover here is from elycefeliz at Flickr. The image of logs cut in Ghana is from acameronhuff at Flickr .The image of Wangari Maathai is from holisticgeek at Flickr.




Download a free sample of the Insider's Guide to Ghana see inside the guide before buying.

Making Sense of Oil Discoveries in Ghana: Part 1, the industry basics

I’ve wanted to write about Ghana’s oil situation for some time. In my past life I worked for the national oil corporation of Japan (JNOC which became JOGMEC) as a researcher covering Oceania for the five years directly before coming to Ghana in 2005. Over time I came to see how awfully inaccurate media reports were regarding this industry and this taught me to never rely on what I read in the paper, but go to the source and check facts myself.

Well, it was my boss who made me do this, thus opening my eyes to reality. When I culled a story about an exploration find from a media source (it was my job to do this daily), he’d request me to call the company and find out if the figures quoted were correct. I was always pleasantly surprised by how helpful all the companies were when I asked to clarify any points. If it was really important, we met the company face-to-face and asked directly. I was also surprised at how cooperative most companies were in this regard too. I had about 150 in-person meetings with oil company executives in the USA and Australia over those 5 years. I developed my own weird, oil-industry shorthand after the first year since I wrote and typed the same terms over and over. Just before I left I counted up the minutes I’d taken and typed up; there were just over 150.

The thing is, though, I often wondered why on earth I stuck in a field (no pun intended), I had no real passion for. But here we are and I shall now try putting that experience to some good use.

In any case, I wanted to truly understand the implications of the discoveries myself. Old habits, perhaps. It felt like a good intellectual challenge, too, and a change from the usual topics I write about. So, I hope this is helpful. And I truly hope this passes fact checking. Any questions, shoot. Finally, in writing this article I’m assuming no prior knowledge so this is basic for anyone with industry experience.

Let’s start with fields, blocks, and licences. These confused me, anyway, once upon a time.

Fields are geological formations in which hydrocarbons—oil or gas—may exist. They are natural formations with natural boundaries. Fields have names to make identifying them easier. In Tullow Oil’s case, the field that contains discoveries off-shore, Western Region, is called the Jubilee field.

Blocks, on the other hand, are areas designated by humans that sit over a natural formation—field. It’s a bit like imagining your house block (a man-made designated area) sitting on a mountain (a much larger geological formation).

A block is an area designated by the host petroleum authority—it’s often rectangular or square (or some other unnatural shape)—and it’s these blocks that are sold to prospective exploration companies who then explore within the block’s borders.

The host petroleum authority usually releases blocks for sale on a regular (annual) basis to the highest bidders. This process is fairly standard around the world. The bidders submit detailed plans for how they will explore in the block—this is called their “work program”. The host authority benefits most if oil is discovered so they will award the block to the most prospective bid which is likely to be more experienced companies with good track records elsewhere and that undertake to explore or invest more (eg. drill more wells) than others.

So, companies don’t just take a block and think, I’ll drill a well and see how it goes. Part of the company’s obligations in the bidding process to the host authority include a written undertaking to complete the “work program”. This includes drilling an agreed number of exploration wells over an agreed period of time. Eg. They may undertake to drill three wells by 2012.

The company must uphold their side of the bargain. If not, they must accept penalties imposed by the host authority for not completing the work program stated in the bid. If they agree to drill three wells, for example, and the first two are unsuccessful (“dry”—no hydrocarbons—they’re not actually free of liquids since they’re underground and underground is wet), the company will be reluctant to drill the third—although they may strike oil in the third. It’s a gamble; oil exploration is a high risk, high (or low, or no) return business.

I’ll mention briefly here that companies generally hope to find oil, because it’s valuable, but they often find gas. Gas is ok if the find is close to the market where it will be consumed, otherwise it’s economically useless. For example, if you look at a map of Australia, exploration companies have discovered a total of over 200 trillion cubic feet of gas (200 tcf) in waters offshore north-western Australia. Australia’s total energy needs are equivalent to approximately 1 (one tcf) of gas annually. That means, current discoveries of gas could supply Australia’s total energy needs, at current levels, for the next 200 years. And estimates are that there is at least double this volume of gas yet to be discovered in Australian waters.

However, the fields are in very deep waters adjacent to the least populated part of the country. Even if they built a pipeline to shore, there is no market for the gas there. The market for gas is on the other side of the country—Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane—several thousand kilometres away across several land-based jurisdictions. And gas cannot be transported like oil just like that. It needs to either be piped in a pipeline or shipped in specially designed LNG (liquefied natural gas) tankers that cost a fortune to build and operate. Gas, by its nature, is not liquid like oil, so it either needs to be chilled to temperatures way below freezing until it becomes a liquid and then shipped or piped.

In Ghana’s case, if a company should discover gas, there is a possibility of tapping into the existing pipeline infrastructure—depending on the agreements—and there is also a ready market and it looks like the companies that discovered oil will do just that with the “associated gas” that comes with an oil discovery.

So back to the bidding. If there are no bidders the authority will keep the blocks for a future release. For example, the blocks may sit in unexplored territory so no one is willing to take the risk now. But someone may eventually take the risk and explore a block in a new area and find oil or gas. If so, other blocks around that area suddenly become attractive and the host authority then might be able to sell them in the next round of bidding.

Right, so you have blocks which the host petroleum authority auctions to exploration companies.

In Tullow Oil’s case, they have several blocks, but there are two important ones:
Deep Water Tano: over Jubilee Field
West Cape Three Points: over Jubilee Field

Deep Water Tano and West Cape Three points sit, as you may have guessed, in deeper ocean waters. This makes developing them more expensive as they need taller platforms, longer drilling equipment, and so on. Wells can cost between 10 million and 100 million dollars to drill—each! The shallower the water depth, the less expensive to drill and develop.

The first wells drilled on a newly acquired block are called exploration wells. If drilling in a completely new area, they’ll call it a “wildcat” well.

Wells are also given names. Naming wells is not very technical; sometimes a well is named after the boss’s wife, sometimes after a famous race horse, or a plant, a geological period, or sometimes after the area in which it’s located (as in the Cape Three Points block).

The well is also given a number. If a well is called Mahogany-1, the “-1” indicates that it’s the first well to be drilled in a series. The first well has nothing to do with production or development of oil—yet. At this stage, the company is in “the exploration phase” and trying to work out if there are any hydrocarbon reserves at all.

If they find hydrocarbons of potentially high value, they will move onto the “appraisal phase” during which they drill more for the purposes of assessing the volume and value of the “reserves”. If they decide the find is commercially viable, they’ll move onto the “development phase”. This whole process takes several years and it’s highly technical involving geologists, geophysicists, financial analysts, lawyers, and other highly skilled professionals that deal with the various aspects of this business. I once worked with a gentleman who was a geophysicist, a qualified lawyer and he also had acquired an MBA—and he was not yet 40! He could analyse discoveries from every essential angle—technical, legal and financial. Needless to say, he worked for an investment bank and I was more than intimidated when working in his presence.

I took a paragraph from a press release at Tullow’s website. It looks confusing, but I explained in simple language below. If you’re interested in this, hang in there as you’ll understand this jargon by the end of this article.

“The accelerated appraisal and development of the Jubilee field continues, with the first appraisal well, Mahogany-2, drilled in May 2008 in the West Cape Three Points block. The well targeted the Turonian turbidite sandstones encountered in the Mahogany-1 and Hyedua-1 discovery wells. Results from Mahogany-2 indicated that Jubilee is a continuous stratigraphic trap extending at least 11 km to the Hyedua-1 discovery well in the adjacent Deepwater Tano block, with combined hydrocarbon columns in excess of 600 metres.”

What that paragraph is saying is, firstly, they are fast-tracking the appraisal and development of the Jubilee field—they are obviously happy with the discoveries and intend to produce oil as quickly as possible. Secondly, the Mahogany wells sit in the West Cape Three Points block which sits over the Jubilee field. At this point, the company is in the appraisal phase and drilled the Mahogany-2 well. “-1, -2, or -3” indicates the order in which wells in a prospect were drilled. They had a clear objective: targeting the Turonian turbidite (geological terms) sandstones that they discovered when they drilled earlier wells: Mahogany-1 and Hyedua-1.

The Hyedua-1 well was the first in a series drilled in the next block, the Deepwater Tano block—which also sits over the Jubilee Field.

In drilling Mahogany-2, they worked out that the Jubilee field extends at least 11 kms (below the ocean floor) to their Hyedua-1 well.

As I said earlier, blocks are artificial areas, often square-shaped, that are owned by exploration companies. Upon discovering oil or gas, they’ll work out where the “field”, the natural geological formation, sits beneath the “man-made” blocks. A field often extends beneath one or more blocks.

Their next paragraph goes like this:

“A drill stem test of Mahogany-2 confirmed that the Jubilee Field reservoirs are highly productive with wells expected to have capacity in excess of 20,000 bopd when completed for production. The results of this well prompted a significant volumetric revision, with the P90 recoverable resources of the field now estimated at over 500 million barrels and the ultimate upside upgraded to 1.8 billion barrels. Two more appraisal wells, Hyedua-2 and Mahogany-3, are planned for 2008 with Mahogany-4 planned for 2009.”

So, to interpret this simply, “drill stem” refers to a piece of the earth that is removed during drilling and then analysed to assess the nature of the geology and the prospectivity.

Their second well, Mahogany-2, helped them to quantify the field’s potential. They estimate 20,000 barrels of oil per day (we’ll get on to what this means in later posts) when “completed for production”.

They mention “P90 recoverable resources”. I’ll explain that here. That’s oil talk for “bloody brilliant odds”. (No wonder wells are sometimes named after race-horses—it’s a gamble.)

Reserves are classified on a scale of “Ps”. This rating system refers to the risk and the probability of oil existing and being producible. You have P90, P50 and P10 that align, respectively, with the concepts “proven reserves,” “probable reserves” and “possible reserves.”

P90 reserves are proven reserves that have a 90% certainty of being produced. Essentially, the company is “reasonably certain” that the reserves can be produced under all current conditions—basically, there are no technical, political, economic or other issues preventing them from producing the reserves. That’s good news for Tullow Oil. They are also called 1P in some circles.

P50 reserves are probable reserves that, as you probably worked out by now, have a 50% “certainty” of being produced (although that’s not very certain if you ask me). They are also called 2P or “Proven + Probable”.

P10 reserves suck if you’re an investor. These are possible reserves that have a 10% chance of being developed under “favourable” circumstances—something needs to change in order for them to develop; maybe it’s a political situation, maybe it’s the technology. They are also called 3P or, yep, “Proven + Probable + Possible.”

(You can imagine my first few oil industry meetings when I was new to all this and had had no training yet… What the hell! 1P, 2P, P+P+P… There were a lot of question marks in my early minutes.)

While I once had a good grasp of this P business, a lot has happened in the last five years, so I refreshed my memory this week by reading Wikipedia’s article and simplifying it for the purposes of this article.

What are recoverable resources?
This refers to the gas or oil that can be extracted, as opposed to the total volume that exists in a “trap”—the formation that holds the oil or gas. A company cannot extract all of what they find. So, an investor is really interested in recoverable resources, but total resources gives prospectors an idea of what’s down there and what may well lie elsewhere.

And notice that they say they’ll drill a second Hyedua and a third Mahogany in 2008, and a fourth Mahogany in 2009? They’re very confident.

The next paragraph says:

“In parallel with the appraisal programme, development planning for the Jubilee field is progressing rapidly. The operator structure is now in place and Tullow has been designated as the field operator. The Jubilee partnership, with the support of the Ghanaian Government, have agreed a plan for Phase One of the development which will focus on the core area of the field utilising an FPSO based sub sea development scheme. The project is targeting first production in the second half of 2010.”

Right. So while they’re still appraising the discoveries, they’re planning the actual development and production phases—the phase where you extract and sell oil in commercial quantities.

“The operator structure….Tullow…designated as field operator.”

Exploration blocks are almost always owned by two or more companies. Hardly does one company ever take 100% ownership. This is because it’s too risky so they offset risk by spreading it across several partners in a formal joint-venture with different share levels. If they fail, all partners share the costs and losses; if they succeed, they share the profits.

The operator is the company that, usually, has the majority share in the block. They take the lead and make the decisions about how to develop the find, often employ their choice of technology in production but all partners have to share the costs so a lot of negotiating takes place about exactly how to proceed. Those interested in conflict management could take lessons from the negotiations undertaken in such circumstances.

As far as ownership of Deepwater Tano and West Cape Three Points licences goes, according to Tullow’s press release, in the first, Tullow has 49.95% ownership, with the other interests being Anadarko, Kosmos, GNPC, Sabre. None of those interests have a greater share than Tullow.

In the latter, Kosmos has 22.90% with Anadarko, GNPC, E.O. Group and Sabre taking up the balance.

There are sophisticated software programmes that show the complex networks of interests in every block around the world. Companies have specialists that forecast who will produce what, where, and when, and how it will impact their partners and competitors. Your partner in one block may be your competitor in another.

An FPSO is a “floating production, storage and offloading” facility—basically a really big floating tank that stores oil during production and will then pump it into oil tankers that ship it to refineries.

“..targeting first production in the second half of 2010…” means pretty much what it says. They aim to produce commercial quantities of oil (not just explore or appraise) from the second half of 2010.

So, in summary, when reading an article about oil production or exploration, check the name of the field, the block, the name of the well, the well’s number (1, 2, 3, 4 which gives you a hint of how mature the exploration program is), the name of the operator, the location, the volume of oil discovered or forecast for production (barrels of oil per day), the type of reserves: P10, P50, P90, and so on.

OK, so that’s the basics of oil production and exploration. In the next post I’ll refer to the issue of the potential boundary dispute with The Ivory Coast. And in the final post I’ll answer the question: What does this mean for Ghana? (I’ll try, anyway.) In that final post I’ll look at the agreement between the national petroleum authority and the oil companies and interpret what this means in terms of income. I’ll explain what that means in economic terms by comparing it to, say, cocoa (if I can find reliable statistics) or other major industries.

Check out Tullow Oil here. The image at the top is a platform courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Timbuktu Chronicles for Top African Bloggers

As far as blogging about African entrepreneurs is concerned, this guy is Michael Jackson. This is one of my top blog picks of all time, even though it’s hosted at a simple blogger platform--content is just as important (if not more) than looks. I never get bored of popping over to the site to see the latest news. It often prompts a post or an idea in my writing too. http://timbuktuchronicles.blogspot.com

Ghanaian students contribute to virtual library

An interview I conducted in 2009 was recently published at Global Voices Online. You can check out the whole interview there at Ghanaian Students Contribute to Virtual Media Library. 

In July 2009 I had the privilege of catching up with old friends and meeting some new faces when Jonathan Thurston, his wife Kristi, and past and present students arrived in Ghana to carry out a book making project with students at a primary school in Elmina, in the Central Region of Ghana.

What’s so special? They use simple, portable technology to inspire creativity and facilitate learning among Ghana’s poorest students. And they use ‘social media’ to establish networks with like-minded individuals and organizations internationally, enhancing development opportunities and increasing the possibility of involving other communities and countries as the organization grows.

Are you MaD?: Education for change

We're doing a series on Making a Difference at G-lish. This is based on our new page, Are You MaD?, which gives you simple ways to make a difference in the various fields focused on the developing world, from education, to micro-finance and peace-building, to name a few. You can check out our post from today, Are you MaD?: Education at www.g-lish.org.

See Inside the Insider's Guide to Ghana

Ghana Blogs I like

Here's a round-up of some of my favourite blogs relating to Ghana by Ghanaians and foreigners alike.

One of the most informative blogs written by a Ghanaian, in my view, is Accra Conscious Forever. Check out the latest post on Twestival using social media to raise funds for education for needy children around Ghana.

When it comes to food, there is no better blog than Betumi. You can read about every kind of dish from Ghana you can imagine at this site. 

Another top Ghanaian writer is E.K. Bensah and his blog The Trials and Tribulations of a Freshly Arrived Denizen of Ghana, with a fantastic view of Akosombo Bridge as the main header. If you want to know what it's like to get caught in Accra traffic, read  The Unbearable Lightness of Being in Spintex Road Traffic. (Great title, crappy situation.)

One of the most beautiful Ghanaian women writers is Maya Mame of Maya's Earth Blog. Her blog is quite personal and gives you a sense of how life is for a Ghanaian-Swede woman bringing up a family here. You also get a sense of life in Ghana.

My Town: Cape Coast

I've started a small series of posts on the theme My Town based on places I've lived around the world in which I post images that tell that town's story, not necessarily what you see in tourist brochures. Living is anything over 4 months...for me. Some of these photos were taken by a friend and former volunteer, Tina. Some were by me. My photos aren't too crash hot, but Tina's are fantastic.So welcome to Cape Coast:

Over the rooftops towards the ocean by Tina. Cape is a hilly town and there are wonderful views if you can handle the sweaty walk to the top.

By Tina. Funerals are a common site on Fridays and weekends all over Cape and Ghana for that matter. This was right outside my former office.

By Tina. Along Jackson Street (Coastal Forex is in that building in the background on the right). You'll meet cheeky children like this everywhere.

By Tina. Fishermen pulling in the nets outside Oasis.

 

By Tina. In the other direction, boys playing football on the beach. Cape Coast Castle in the background.

  

By Tina. Another view of hilly Cape with the ocean in the background

  

By Tina. My favourite jollof rice lady, sitting opposite Melcom, on the main street of Cape Coast

 

These cleaning and tooth paste advertisements covered the whole wall of the building by the one main traffic light in town some years ago.

Baobab photos and sunsets in Bolgatanga

A gorgeous sunset through the baobab tree in Bolgatanga.