Koforidua — The Maintenance and Road Area Managers from across the country have completed a five day training programme organised by the Ministry of Roads and Highways in Koforidua, the Eastern Regional capital.

It was meant to upgrade their skills and knowledge in the field of road maintenance works, to make it more efficient in the discharge of their duties, as far as road maintenance works were concerned.

The Acting Deputy Chief Executive of Maintenance at the Ministry of Roads and Highways, Mr Lawrence Lloyd Lankwei Lamptey, in an address revealed that 30 per cent of the country's roads were in good condition while 46 per cent rated as being in fair condition with 19 per cent classified as being in poor condition.

He explained that, inadequate funding from the government has also led to a drastic reduction in road maintenance works across the country, adding that this was likely affected by the ministry from achieving its 2037 road covered plan.

He said delays in the allocation of funds from the government have made maintenance work to reduce drastically across the country.

The Eastern Regional Director of Roads and Highway Authority, Patrick Okoto, for his part, said though the department is faced with financial constraints, the Authority is supervising 68 development projects and entreated engineers in charge of the projects to adopt innovative ways to execute them.

The Director of Road Maintenance at the Ghana Highway Authority, Mr Maama Sawyerr-Markwei, reiterated that the economy is in times of financial scarcity which according to him has made logistics limited in all the regions.

This, he said, has also made it difficult for Road Contractors to be on site thereby impeding the progress of road construction across the country.

During the five-day training, the road engineers were taken through the duties and responsibilities of supervising teams on projects in all regions, geometric designs and interpretation of critical designs, core specification, pavement designs and material selection.