Mr. Franklin Cudjoe, Executive Director of Imani Centre for Policy and Education (ICPE) has called on government to develop a comprehensive national policy that would help educate the public on the negative effects of alcohol.

Mr Cudjoe said this in Accra at one of a series of workshops on national alcohol draft policy consideration organized by the ICPE to consider, approve and agree on its draft national alcohol policy, that would be presented to government and its stakeholders for adoption.

He said the nation needed a coherent framework that would help design effective alcohol directives as to who qualifies to take alcohol and at what age adding, “although people do take alcohol, we do not have data on alcohol”.

Mr. Cudjoe, said policy enactment alone was not enough but there was also the need to develop effective mechanisms towards enforcement.

He said ICPE, together with the public and the private sector had developed a national draft policy which sought to prevent and minimize alcohol related harms to individuals and families in the context of developing safer and healthier patterns of drinking.

According to him, the draft also aimed at developing and implementing a transparent self-regulatory systems by which the alcoholic beverage industry would ensure that production, promotion and marketing of its products were consistent with the requirement and met the international standards.

He said some participants in the previous meeting recommended that for Ghana to reduce the incidence of intoxication, responsible service practices in licensed environment was important, but needed to be accompanied by law enforcement which would lead to reduced serving of intoxicated people on licensed premises.

Keith R. Evans, Chairman of the Australian Intergovernmental Committee on Drugs said placing a ban on advertisement of alcoholic beverages would not change the drinking behaviour of the people.

He called for effective measures must be put in place to check the high rate of alcohol intake.

Franklin Cudjoe is Executive Director of Imani: The Centre for Humane Education, a think-tank based in Accra dedicated to researching economic trends to glean practical public-policy insights for the benefit of government, business and civil society in Ghana.

Source: Joy FM

Popularity: 27% [?]