Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
land and during harvesting. Very often there are festivals, such as the Homowo
(Ga people), Akwambo (Gomoa), Ohum (Akyem Abuakwa), Odwira
(Akuapem), and Kundum (Nzema), at harvesting to commemorate the generos-
ity of Mother Earth.
In order to allow Mother Earth continuously to play her mothership role and
enhance the biodiversity that the earth contains, humanity has developed a body
of laws and rules known as taboos to regulate its relationship with the environ-
ment (Abayie-Boaten, 1999).
Hagan (1999) lists the following seven traditional laws for the sustainable use
of biosystems:
•
laws of exclusion prohibiting entry into forests, lakes, and rivers except at
periods of severe scarcity and critical needs
•
laws of selective extraction protecting certain species or prohibiting the destruc-
tion and use of immature animals, e.g. pregnant animals were generally not
killed for consumption
•
laws governing diversification of use, to avoid over-exploitation of one or two
crops or animals in the clan/community diet
•
laws regulating exploitation, enforced by rites of closing and opening of rivers,
lakes, estuaries, and forests under constant use, to enable the regeneration of
species in ecosystems
•
laws enforcing community involvement in land preparation for farming, to
ensure the containment of fire hazards
•
laws protecting special species of plants and animals from misuse, to ensure
high stock levels, e.g. certain tree species are not to be felled for fuelwood
•
laws enforcing rites for the felling of big trees and killing of certain animals,
to ensure the protection of these organisms and also make the ecosystem
secure.
In addition, environmentally low-impact systems and tools have been devel-
oped over the years for tillage of the land in a sustainable manner.
A notable law or taboo is the one that prohibits the felling of certain species of
trees, e.g. “
odum
”-
Milicia excelsa
, and “mahogany” -
Khaya ivorensis
, unless
some rituals are performed, because those trees are considered sacred. Busia
(1954) recounts a typical story of tree ritual as follows:
An Ashanti craftsman will endeavour to propitiate certain trees before he cuts them down.
He will offer an egg, for example, to the
odum
tree, saying “I am about to cut you down
and carve you; do not let me suffer any harm.”
Similar rituals are performed on several other trees, and this helped to preserve
several economic trees as well as other trees which were not economically use-
ful but useful in maintenance of the environment. Such trees as “
onyina
”,
Ceiba
pentandra
,“
akonkodie
”,
Bombax buonopozense
, and tall “
beten
”,
Elaeis guinen-
sis
, can be cited as examples of trees that enjoyed the kind of protection.
