Fire management policy and environmental NGO movement: critical contemporary perspectives, indicators and prospects in savannas, Ghana

Abstract

Fire management policy is an intrinsic tool that cannot be neglected in the management of the processes of sustainable natural resource utilisation and human-induced burning in savannas but that has rather been a predominating case in most savanna regions in sub-Saharan Africa. Where an official fire policy exists, it is principally not efficiently implemented or consistently practised. New fire policy trends have recently emerged out of institutionally vibrant relations amongst environmental non-governmental organizations (NGOs), local civil societies and government institutions in Ghana. The real outcomes from the relations have been the formulation of a new fire policy and unprecedented (re)production of robust institutional capital suitable for the management of savanna fire and the environment. This article draws on these outcomes to review fire occurrences and contemporary fire policy issues, the essence of building environmental NGO alliances and the prospects of engaging major grassroots stakeholders in fire management processes. It then explores new convertible indicators from and within the subspaces of the policy to generate important information to further new theoretical thinking of fire policies rather than conventionally uncritical rethinking of fire management in the savannas.