US authorities do not know what killed Ghanaian student

The cause of death of Nana Kwasi Baffour-Awuah, a Ghanaian student of Iowa College in the US who was found dead on campus is yet to be known, the Chicago Tribune has reported.

The report cited Assistant Decorah Police Chief Dave Smutzler as saying that the police department is waiting for the autopsy and toxicology reports about the cause of death.

Smutzler added that authorities won’t speculate on the matter but rather continue conducting thorough investigations to get more information on the matter.

The body of Kwasi Baffour-Awuah, a student of the Luther College in the Iowa State was found Saturday in the snow on the baseball diamond on campus.

A prayer vigil was held Monday for Baffour-Awuah, who had stayed on campus with other international students over the winter break.

By Ekow Quandzie
ghanabusinessnews.com

Ghana’s $1.2b gas plant soon to be completed

Ghana’s commercial oil production started on December 15, 2010 after President John Evans Atta Mills symbolically turned the wheel on the FPSO vessel to signify the beginning of the country’s first oil.

The government is making efforts to put in place structures for the country’s nascent oil sector.

A deputy Minister of Information, Mr Samuel Okudzeto-Ablakwa has been cited by the Daily Graphic saying that Ghana’s $1.2 billion gas industrialisation project at Bonyere in the Western Region which is expected to produce 300 million cubic feet of gas from the Jubilee Field daily is at an advanced stage.

According to the newspaper, Mr Ablakwa explained that as part of the Bonyere gas processing project, a 150km gas pipeline would be laid from Bonyere to the Aboadze Thermal Plant at Aboadze to expand the country’s capacity to generate more energy to ensure stable electricity supply.

When completed, the project would carry gas offshore from the Jubilee Field to the gas plant for processing, it said.

Mr Ablakwa added that a multi-million dollar fertiliser processing plant would also be established in the Western Region using ammonia and urea from wet gas from the Jubilee Field.

By Ekow Quandzie
ghanabusinessnews.com

Ghana gets $270m EximBank of China loan, $75m World Bank support to provide water for Accra

Ghana has recently signed an agreement with the Export-Import Bank of China for a $270 million concessionary loan and the country is partnering with the World Bank in a water and sanitation project that would help distribute water with a special focus on the most vulnerable in the capital Accra, the World Bank has said.

The current water and sanitation situation in Accra can best be described as inadequate for a bustling capital.

About 90% of residents in Accra have access to safe drinking water, but only about one-third have drinking water running through their pipes at home, and even among the group, many get only an irregular supply of water.

Many households in Accra usually buy water for flushing and washing from private water tankers, and drinking water from private producers.

Beatrix Allah-Mensah, a World Bank social development specialist says, “Those with no room to store water mainly the poor pay more for it.”

The World Bank and other partners, including the African Development Bank, the Netherlands, and the Canadian International Development Agency, have been working with the Ghanaian government to increase access to safe water and improved sanitation such as toilets, sewerage and septic systems, and latrines, in rural and urban areas.

Ghana through these efforts is making is making steady progress toward the United Nations Millennium Development Goal (MDG) for safe drinking water.  According to a 2009 World Bank study, Transforming Africa s Infrastructure, the country is one of only four (and one of two low-income) countries in sub-Saharan Africa on track to meet the goal by 2015.

Access to safe water rose from only about half of the population in 1990 to 82% in 2008, according to the World Health Organization/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply and Sanitation.

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi
ghanabusinessnews.com