This year’s theme, “Invest in Peace: For Everyone, Everywhere, Every Day,” is both a call to action and a reminder that peace does not happen by chance. Peace requires commitment, choices — and investment.

At a time when countries are spending more on war and armaments, we must ask ourselves: What would happen if we invested more deliberately in the conditions that make peace possible?

For Ghana, investing in peace means investing in people and communities. It means investing in education, decent work, healthcare, justice, accountable institutions and opportunities for our young people.

It means recognising that peace and security are not only about protecting territory or controlling threats. They are fundamentally about human security and human development.

It means investing in our youth, not simply as beneficiaries of peace, but as partners and leaders in building it.

It means investing in women and girls as agents of peace — as mediators, community leaders, peacebuilders, decision-makers and voices for change. We cannot build sustainable peace while leaving half of our population at the margins of peace and security processes.

It also means investing in responsible arms control.

Ghana has made important commitments to preventing the illicit circulation and misuse of small arms and weapons. But responsible security is not simply about having more weapons. It is about ensuring that weapons are properly controlled, that communities are protected, and that security institutions serve and safeguard people.

And investment in peace is not always about money.

Sometimes, investing in peace means investing our time — taking the time to listen before we respond.

It means investing in trust — between citizens and institutions, between communities, and between people who may not always agree.

It means investing in dialogue instead of division, mediation instead of violence, and prevention instead of waiting for conflict to escalate.

For more than two decades, FOSDA has sought to make these investments through our work with women, young people, communities, civil society, government and partners across Ghana and beyond.

Our experiences remind us that peace is not built only in negotiating rooms or through international agreements.

The conflicts we have witnessed in places such as Bawku and Nkwanta, and other localised conflicts across Ghana, teach us that sustainable peace must be built from the ground up. It must respond to the realities of the people and communities who experience both peace and conflict.

Peace is built every day — in our homes, our communities, our institutions and in the choices we make about how we treat one another.

On this International Day of Peace, FOSDA calls on all of us to invest in peace — for everyone, everywhere, every day.

Let us invest in the National Peace Council and the institutions that carry Ghana’s peacebuilding architecture.

Let us invest in people.

Let us invest in women and youth.

Let us invest in dialogue, trust and responsible security.

And let us invest in a future where peace is not simply an aspiration, but a way of life.

Happy International Day of Peace.

Thank you.