Afforestation: Niger Seeks Partnership With NDDC, Others

Niger State governor, Umaru Bago, has sought partnership with the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) to plant trees as a means of tackling climate change. He urged the commission to join in the crusade of planting trees.

Bago who made this known at an event organised on the sidelines of the ongoing COP28 Climate Summit in the United Arab Emirates, said afforestation would check the high emission of greenhouse gases.

The governor said Niger State has 76, 000 square kilometres of arable land which planting trees will balance the ecosystem.

He said in addressing climate change issues it was critical to address three areas that include the root causes, its impact and the way forward.

Bago said Nigeria has woken up to the realities to understand that global warming is a reality and expressed the readiness of the country to combat global warming.

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He said: “I am really happy to be part of this auspicious occasion. The managing director of the NDDC spoke very well. Now in undertaking climate change, there are three very important levels: 

One, the root causes which you explained very well, the exploration of oil and also the flaring of gas.

“The second issue is the impact of that activity to humanity and environment. The third one, one that I am sure you would have enumerated is what I would help you to do which is the way forward. How do we mitigate this?

“Now I am from Niger State. It is 76,000 square kilometres of arable land. It has two major rivers flowing through, it has four hydro-powered dams. And this land is arable. Now that we are here, we need to encourage the NDDC to join in the crusade of planting trees to balance the ecosystem. When you spoke about carbon credit, one of the advantages is planting trees. Where you have high emission, the ecosystem is affected.

“Now where you have low emission and you have plenty reserve of land, what we need to do is to make sure we increase our capacity in afforestation, first. Second to also prepare us to understand the challenges of agriculture is land preparation.

“So, the companies who are in this exploration should come in as a corporate social responsibility in making sure that we green our land and reduce emission. When you do that, you change alternative source of energy. Instead of fossil fuel, we come back to green fuel or blue energy,” Bago said.