Bassett and Kabala to Lead Grant-Funded Trip to Ghana

Dean Dorothy Bassett of the School of Leadership and Professional Advancement and Dr. Stanley J. Kabala, associate director of the Center for Environmental Research and Education, will lead 20 American environmental and energy professionals to Ghana during July—and will make gifts of water-cleansing pots, like the ones made by their Ghanaian counterparts when they were in Pittsburgh last year, to African communities.

The month-long immersion, focused on energy issues, is the result of a partnership between the University of Ghana and Duquesne. The program is supported by a two-year, $350,000 grant from the U.S. Department of State to train emerging leaders from both countries to handle the complex societal, economic and environmental challenges arising from energy extraction.

The University of Ghana in Accra will host this Emerging Leaders’ Extraction and Environment Program exchange from July 3-July 30.

“This program will provide the American participants with an opportunity to observe how another country is dealing with extractive industries,” Bassett said. “It’s my hope that they will learn about successful approaches that are different from those generally used in the U.S., including strategies for mitigating any negative environmental and societal impacts associated with industry activities.”

Last summer, Duquesne hosted 22 Ghanaian government, nonprofit and corporate professionals who examined the Marcellus Shale natural gas extraction/drilling in Western Pennsylvania and mountaintop coal removal in West Virginia.

“The Ghanaian professionals, when they visited Western Pennsylvania, learned about American expectations,” said Kabala, an expert in international environmental affairs. “They came here thinking we had it all figured out and saw it’s actually not that way; we have controversy and debate. They realized there are challenges and there are things they need to incorporate into some of their strategies.

“We are not experts going to advise the Ghanaians, so I’m curious to see how the visiting Americans will use the learning they give us and how it affects directly what they do in the U.S.”

The American team of students and emerging leaders was selected from more than 65 applicants nationwide, with participants representing 12 states including Hawaii, California, New York, Virginia and Oregon. One Duquesne graduate student, Montreal-born Amellie Ouellette, is one of only three Pittsburgh participants in the trip.  Ouellette, who is committed to volunteerism, will help to deliver water-cleansing colloidal silver pots to impoverished communities in Ghana.  The pots were created as part of a service learning project by last year’s cohort of Ghanaian professionals during their stay in Pittsburgh. The silver in the ceramic vessels, which look like overgrown flower pots, radiates and kills bacteria, saving lives and the misery caused by water-borne illnesses.

While in Africa sharing the pots and absorbing pieces of Ghanaian culture, the American team will become familiar with off-shore oil drilling and the social and environmental issues it poses, the challenges of salt, sand and stone mines, the role of women in the Ghanaian energy marketplace, charcoal production, thermal energy and environmentally friendly beach resorts, among other topics.

Bassett and Kabala will also have opportunity to reconnect with many of those Ghanaians who studied in Western Pennsylvania last summer.