George Agyemang Sarpong is the Managing Partner of G.A. Sarpong & Co., Legal Practitioners and Consultants, Accra, Ghana; and a former Director of the Ghana School of Law. His specialist areas include Law of the Sea, Biotechnology, Land Use Planning and Mining. George is an alumnus of the Faculty of Law University of Ghana (LL.B. – 1981); the Ghana School of Law (B.L. – 1983); the University of British Columbia (LL.M. International Law – 1984); and the University of London School of Oriental and African Studies (LL.M. – Environmental Law, Occasional Student – 1995). He has been the recipient of many awards, fellowships and visiting scholarships, including from the UN (Human Rights Studies, Geneva and Strasbourg) and the Universities of British Columbia, Leiden, Nottingham, Queens (Belfast) and North-Western (United States).
George entered academia after a career in the Ghana Armed Forces. He trained at the Ghana Military Academy and the Combat Arms School CFB Gagetown, New Brunswick (Canada). He was commissioned into the Recce Regiment of the Ghana Armed Forces in 1973, and served in various capacities including Squadron Leader, 3 Squadron, Recce Regiment and Administrator at the Legal Services Directorate of the Ghana Armed Forces. He was a member of the Commission of Enquiry into the Organisational Structure of the Ghana Armed Forces (General Erskine Commission) in 1987-1989; and an Adjunct Lecturer of the Law of the Sea at the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College. He honourably retired with the rank of Major in 1990.
George joined the Faculty of Law, University of Ghana in 1990. He served for 16 years during which period he taught Public International Law, Law of Contract, Business and Environmental Laws. He also served on several boards and committees of the university. He has published extensively in local and international journals on Public International and Environmental Law and attended several training programmes and conferences in his areas of expertise. He has also been involved in several initiatives as legal consultant to the Government of Ghana, UN bodies and international agencies in the implementation of projects, programmes and policies on sustainable development in several sectors including irrigation, fisheries, wetlands, land use planning, biodiversity, biotechnology, mining, plant health, environmental health and food safety.
George is a member of the Ghana Bar. He was a member of the African Union’s High-Level African Panel on Modern Biotechnology that provided a blueprint for biotechnology in Africa. He is currently a member of the World Commission on Environmental Law (WCEL) of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
