Ghanaian female activist to swim 450km in Volta River to highlight textile pollution

Yvette Tetteh, an activist from Ghana, is attempting to swim a 450km along the Volta River in what she hopes will bring some attention to a form of pollution in the water that has been overlooked by many, and for many years.

If successful, she hopes that the continuous textile’s pollution that has plagued Ghana’s rivers will be given some careful attention and, eventually, some redresses made towards them.

Speaking to the BBC’s Focus on Africa about her new challenge, Yvette said that one of her greatest joys in swimming in Africa, although it is not one of the continent’s biggest sports, is that she is able to draw a sizeable amount of attention to her activism.

She adds that many people get even more interested in her activism when they realise it is a woman doing so.

“For me, the experience of swimming is an absolute joy, and getting to swim in the rivers and different water bodies we have in Ghana is just a wonderful experience… but as close as I can come to sharing that experience, is I really wanted to share it with other people, and, the thing that swimming does is really bring attention to water, and water bodies, and water quality, and get people thinking about nature, and swimming and how it is.

“That is what I love about our expedition. It really is something that is so surprising, and exciting to people, and I say many times that when I was swimming in the middle of the Volta Lake, in the most remote areas, it was always very strange to feel very alone, but then, when we’ve been swimming past areas where people live… and then I could really see how people are excited about the project.

“And then there’s also this interesting gender-dynamics where not only are people surprised to see someone swimming, because it’s not familiar to swim as a leisure activity, but then also to see a woman swimming, and so it ends up being this really great entry point for them talking about why I’m swimming to bring attention to textile waste, and to think about the influx of second-hand clothing to Ghana,” she explained.

Yvette Tetteh, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Pure and Just Company Limited, a youth-powered agro-processing company catalysing African potential, also explained that what many people have not noticed is that Ghana’s water bodies contain a chunk of textiles waste.

She further stated that this waste situation is something that is prevalent in places like Accra, and she hopes her activism will bring some solutions to the continuous pollution.

“What we have found is that there is way more micro-fibres in the water than you would expect to see. The water bodies in Accra, for instance, the Korle Lagoon, have worrying large levels of micro-fibres, and in fact, you don’t even have to think of micro-fibres because you can literally see the textile waste in huge mounts in the water, to the side of the water, basically spilling over designated waste sites, and that’s been very clear in our research,” she added.