Ghana’s Electric Dreams
Explores environmental and social consequences of creating the world’s largest man-made lake, Lake Volta
Ghana’s Electric Dreams
Explores environmental and social consequences of creating the world’s largest man-made lake, Lake Volta
Ghana’s Electric Dreams
Explores environmental and social consequences of creating the world’s largest man-made lake, Lake Volta
“Nobody should be made worse off” was the ideal espoused by President Kwame Nkrumah when the Akosombo Dam was promoted as the engine of development for newly independent Ghana. This episode of Ghana’s Electric Dreams interrogates the high modernist ideals of the planners and administrators of the Volta River Project. Although now retired and seated on a leafy veranda, two former heads of the Volta River Authority eagerly explain their efforts to bring progress to Ghanaians, including the 80,000 people who were resettled from the area flooded by the dam. Their explanations are juxtaposed with the recollections of rural people struggling to survive in some of the 52 resettlement towns hastily built to accommodate displaced people whose lives were forever changed. Rather than telling a story of victims and perpetrators, the film is an account of human ingenuity and resilience in the face of unplanned political turmoil and unforeseen challenges. While visiting these communities around the lake, we learn about unfulfilled promises and misplaced expectations that played out in the intersection of powerful new technologies and the clashing world views of urban elites and rural people.
This episode of Ghana’s Electric Dreams explores the many unanticipated environmental and cultural consequences that arose from the creation of the world’s largest man-made lake at the time. The film takes us across the water to meet people whose lives have been forever altered by it. The Volta Lake flooded 3,283 square miles of riverine forests and fertile grasslands, creating a vast aquatic environment for a bountiful fishing industry. When the ecology downstream changed as a result of the dam, the economy of those communities dried up, causing many people to migrate to fishing villages around the lake. Children from newly impoverished areas often found themselves sold into servitude, working in
the fishing industry on the lake. We learn from Ghanaians about their efforts to solve some of the unexpected problems and to adapt to the changed ecosystem.
This episode of Ghana’s Electric Dreams explores the many unanticipated environmental and cultural consequences that arose from the creation of the world’s largest man-made lake at the time. The film takes us across the water to meet people whose lives have been forever altered by it. The Volta Lake flooded 3,283 square miles of riverine forests and fertile grasslands, creating a vast aquatic environment for a bountiful fishing industry. When the ecology downstream changed as a result of the dam, the economy of those communities dried up, causing many people to migrate to fishing villages around the lake. Children from newly impoverished areas often found themselves sold into servitude, working in
the fishing industry on the lake. We learn from Ghanaians about their efforts to solve some of the unexpected problems and to adapt to the changed ecosystem.