The United Nations Platform for Space-based Information for Disaster Management and Emergency Response (UN-SPIDER), with headquarters in Bonn, Germany, has given the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) the permit to leverage the UN-SPIDER’s satellite platform for emergency response in Ghana.

The UN-SPIDER is a platform which facilitates the use of space-based technologies for disaster emergency response in countries.

The Director-General of NADMO, Mr Eric Nana Agyemang-Prempeh, who made this known in an interview with the Daily Graphic in Accra yesterday, said NADMO was admitted to the platform after its technical officers had successfully completed various training sessions in Bonn, Vienna and Beijing late last year.

He said Ghana had thus become the first country in West Africa to be hooked onto the platform, adding that from its current position, NADMO was placed to assist other West African nations to battle disasters when they were in distress.

How it operates

Explaining how the system operated, Nana Agyemang-Prempeh said in the event of a major disaster, trained officers of NADMO, with the use of their laptops, would, in a matter of seconds, receive real-time satellite images of what was happening in the disaster area to enable the nation to respond appropriately.

He said Ghana’s disaster management strategy was moving away from mechanical to remote sensing where the emergency response could reach disaster sites, no matter where they occurred, without much difficulty.

Legislative Instrument

Nana Agyemang-Prempeh said two years into the change of leadership, NADMO had seen appreciable changes in its operations.

For instance, he said, work on the Legislative Instrument (LI) for the implementation of the new NADMO Act 2016 (Act 927) was almost complete and would soon be laid before Parliament.

He said a lot of work had gone into the work to ensure that NADMO strengthened its operations in order to manage disasters more efficiently.