Population and Development Fact Sheet Five has projected Ghana's population to increase to 62.9 per cent by 2025 from 43.8 per cent in 2000 if effective strategies were not developed to prevent the rapid growth of population and urbanization.
The challenges posed by the rapid urbanization in areas of unemployment; poor sanitation and crime could also threaten the aspirations of the country to reach its middle income status by 2020.
Ms. Sherry Ayittey, Minister of Environment Science and Technology said this when she launched the fact sheet on Tuesday in Accra.
The paper, prepared by the National Population Council (NPC) in September 2008 is on "Population and Urbanization".
The fact sheet looks at the global situation, Ghana's situation, causes of urbanization, its problems, opportunities of urbanization and the way forward.
Ms Ayittey said problems such as unplanned settlement, poor housing conditions, congestion, air and water pollution, unsanitary living conditions must be addressed with all seriousness to avert the situation.
Statistics show that there has been a rapid growth of urban population with an increase from 23.1 per cent in 1960 to 43.8 per cent in 2000.
Citing examples of the development issues, the Minister said about 42 per cent of households obtained water from unprotected sources whilst 16 per cent used boreholes.
With disposal of solid waste, 25 per cent of the population in urban areas dump discriminately, 58 per cent either use public dumping facilities or resort to burning and burying waste at their backyards.
On household waste, about 95 per cent households dispose their liquid waste into unapproved places nationwide.
Ms Ayittey expressed concern about building permits being issued for the construction of houses without toilet facilities though there was a government policy that insisted that houses in towns and cities must have toilet facilities.
"Lack of implementation and supervision by responsible agencies have resulted in filth that has engulfed our cities, towns and even our villages", she added.
She said the ministry will work with the district assemblies to ensure that the practice was minimized and dealt with completely.
Mr Steve Grey, Deputy Director of NPC who presented the fact sheet said localities in Ghana with a population of 5,000 or more were classified as urban. He said rural-urban migration was the main cause of the rapid increase of growth population with the youth being the most affected.
This, he said would have serious repercussions on agricultural production if systematic action was not taken to effectively improve the management of urban and rural phenomenon and to capitalize on the poverty reduction development opportunities offered by urbanization.
Mr Grey noted that despite the challenges posed by urbanization, it offered opportunities such as availability of labour for industrial development, market for agricultural produce, well planned centres that provided social services and the provision of conducive environment for commerce.
He noted that with the kind of rapid growth expected in the urban areas in the next 25 years, government and municipal authorities would have to ensure that the situation was taken into consideration in the planning of cities.
"Well planned and orderly urban centres would provide an opportunity to offer social services to a large population in a cost-effective manner".
He called for effective data for planning purposes for all sectors of the economy and entreated decision makers and policy makers to make good use of the data for comprehensive policy and development implementation.
Mr Makane Kane, UNFPA Country Representative expressed UNFPA's continuous partnership with NPC and Ghana Statistical Service in making reliable data available to ensure efficient analysis of the country's situation as well as monitoring and evaluation of programmes.
The Government Statistician, Dr. Grace Bediako, who chaired stressed the need to strengthen partnership and more collaboration with research to produce more fact sheets to fill the gap in knowledge.
She said advocacy was the key in ensuring that the fact sheets were known and understood by all and urged all stakeholders to play their respectful roles in the use of the information.