Food and Public Health are inseparable. We talk about food in terms of safe food, healthy food, junk food, unhealthy food, and ultra-processed food. The healthiness of food (or lack thereof) is influenced by multiple factors including food marketing, food fraud, food policy, food politics, food justice, food democracy, and food environments. Of equal importance are the impacts of unhealthy food on human health and planetary health. Such impacts include hunger, and diet-related non-communicable diseases (NCDs) – obesity, hypertension, stroke, ischemic heart disease, and diabetes.
GAAS News
Food and Public Health are inseparable. We talk about food in terms of safe food, healthy food, junk food, unhealthy food, and ultra-processed food. The healthiness of food (or lack thereof) is influenced by multiple factors including food marketing, food fraud, food policy, food politics, food justice, food democracy, and food environments. Of equal importance are the impacts of unhealthy food on human health and planetary health. Such impacts include hunger, and diet-related non-communicable diseases (NCDs) – obesity, hypertension, stroke, ischemic heart disease, and diabetes.
Nation-building is an effort by a State – a political and legal entity in international law – to attune its citizens to its pursuit of the ideals of nationhood. Nation-building, thus, signifies both a political and moral need. Political because of the aspiration to forge a political unit whose citizens think, act and live in unified pursuit of demarcated ideals – in the case of Ghana – of the ideals of freedom and justice. And moral because the ideals such as freedom and justice are moral, in as much as they seek to ensure the harmonious coexistence of Ghanaians; as well as their survival, interests and welfare. For these reasons, politics furthers the ends of ethics, and so the former ought to be guided by the latter. Thus, the nation-state of Ghana, as a political entity in pursuit of the ideal of nationhood, ought to assume a moral duty to work unceasingly toward achieving the common good of Ghanaians. This lecture enunciates and defends the thesis that philosophers who have been affiliated with the University of Ghana have produced a body of thought and a systematic approach to philosophy that merits the status of a tradition of philosophy; and that this tradition is exemplified by distinctive moral philosophical perspectives that are germane to the task of nation building in Ghana.
The Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences (GAAS), the nation’s premier learned society, today publicly launched a twenty-four-month Higher Education project on the theme, “Motivating Higher Education Reforms in Ghana – Towards Equity and Sustainability”. The US$116,000 project is sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York.
Prof. Clifford Nii Boi Tagoe, Chair of the Project Steering Committee said in his welcoming remarks that over time, increasing low levels of public investment in, and support to, knowledge-producing institutions such as the Academy, has hampered their abilities effectiveness in commissioning and disseminating research findings to influence policy and shape public education. He said that notwithstanding, the Academy had not rested on its oars and continues to leverage its convening power to assemble learned teams and panels on critical issues in the arts and sciences at regularly organized public lectures, symposia, and forums.
On Thursday, 08 December 2022, the Academy hosted Professor Gérard Mourou, Nobel Prize winner in Physics for 2018, at a special lecture on “Extreme Light: Its Benefits to Science and Society. Prof. Mourou reflected on the work he and his PhD student, Donna Strickland, co-winner of the Nobel Prize did to receive the award. He said Chirped-pulse amplification, or CPA, which is really, the best in the world right now, is a technique for creating ultrashort, yet extremely high-energy laser pulses necessary in a variety of applications, including more precise and less expensive medical and surgical operations; clean and safe energy to replace fossil fuel and uranium usage options; as well as the removal of millions of orbital debris cluttering space.
22 Nov: Professor Ivan Addae-Mensah, FGA calls for a review of the Free Senior High School Programme
Professor Ivan Addae-Mensah, a Fellow of the Academy on Friday 18th of November 2022 called for a review of the Free Senior High School programme, saying the current financing regime is not sustainable. He was delivering the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Lecture on the topic “Educational Reforms in Ghana and their Impact on the Youth.
The Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences on Friday, 18th of November 2022 commemorated some Fellows who have distinguished themselves and contributed to the development of the Academy. The Chairman of the Commemoration Committee, Prof. Henry Nii-Adziri Wellington, in his speech, said there are 2 categories of Fellows to be commemorated. They are the living and deceased Fellows.
The Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences, on Tuesday 15th November 2022 inducted into Fellowship fifteen distinguished Ghanaian personalities comprising Prof. Samuel Agyei-Mensah, Professor of Geography; Ace Anan Ankomah, a Lawyer; Prof. Kwasi Ampene, Professor of Ethnomusicology and Maxwell Opoku-Afari, First Deputy Governor, Bank of Ghana from the Arts Section; and Prof. Her Graves Winful, Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; Prof. Evans Adei, Associate Professor specializing in Computational Chemistry; Prof. Dorothy Yeboah-Manu, Professor of Microbiology; Prof. Richmond Nii Okai Aryeetey, Associate Professor specializing in Public Health Nutrition; Prof. Elsie Effah Kaufmann; Associate Professor specializing in Biomedical Engineering, Prof. Amos Kankponang Laar, Associate Professor specializing in Bioethics and Public Health Nutrition, Prof. Marian Asantewaa Nkansah, Associate Professor specializing in Environmental Chemistry, Prof. Jehoram Tei Anim, Professor of Histopathology; Prof. Bruce Banoeng-Yakubo, Professor of Geology; Prof. Sarah Darkwa, Professor of Food Science; and Prof. Dorcas Osei-Safo, Associate Professor specializing in Natural Products Chemistry, from the Sciences Section.
The Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences on Friday, 4th of November 2022 organised the Shine Mentorship Program for some selected public basic schools in its catchment area. The participating schools were Pig-farm JHS and Abavanna 4 & 5 JHS. The program was held at the GAAS auditorium in Accra.
Dr. Nii Darku Quaynor, FGA on Thursday 06 of October 2022 has said Ghana has enormous traditional technologies and tools, which when developed into modern educational and computational tools will be critical for national development. He said whiles delivering his annual lecture on the theme “The Science of Oware Board” at the Academy’s auditorium.