Chairperson of the Coalition of Non-Governmental Organizations in Water and Sanitation (CONIWAS), Atta Arhin, has recommended some measures for reducing flooding in the country.

This recommendation comes after parts of Accra and other urban centres in the Greater Accra Region, including North Kaneshie, Kwame Nkrumah Circle and Kasoa in the Central Region, were flooded as a result of hours of rain on Saturday.

Speaking in an interview on Joy FM's Midday News on Monday, Mr. Arhin urged the government to re-engineer the drainage architecture across the country.

He also called on the government to “prioritise environmental sanitation as a core component of our development process.”

The above-mentioned key component, he claims, is something the country has refused to undertake, adding that “as long as we refuse to do this, it will come back to haunt us.”

“Look, we have been calling for a National Sanitation Authority to sanitise the sanitation terrain. This has not been done..," he added.

He also proposed a phase-out of some plastic materials. According to Mr. Arhin, there must be a rigorous implementation of waste recycling. This, he mentioned is as a result of the low percentage of recycled waste in the country.

“Only two percent of waste in this country is recycled. Thank God 90 per cent of all the plastic waste in this country can be recycled,” he said.

In his view, if waste recycling is implemented, “the country will be so clean within the shortest possible time.”

He also questioned the delay by Parliament in disbursing waste recycled funds collected from plastic imports since 2011.

He added that, "in our estimation, this fund has accrued in excess of 1 billion cedis yet no disbursement has been made since 2011. So if this is done, many people will be encouraged to go into recycling and you would not be seeing the plastics around."