Director Blames Pollution For Poor Yields

The general negative ef fects on the environment in the Niger Delta region by oil firms has been blamed for the poor agricultural yield and output by farmers over the years.

Baring his mind on the contentious issue recently in his office in Port Harcourt with our correspondent, Director, Institute of Pollution Studies in the Rivers State University of Science and Technology, RSUST, Prof. Alex Chindah explained that the truth was that oil activities such as pipeline laying, oil spill, operational failure among others have left a lot of the environment devastated.

He said the opening of pipeline routes through areas that were meant to be conserved and ordinarily not accessible opened them up and created routes for man and animals alike which help destroy farms, as evidenced by mass cattle movement throughout the region.

He explained that even when oil spills occur either by accident or sabotage, adequate attention was not given and wondered why they don’t take good time to make sure that they clean the environment as it where.

“They just do a wishy-washy job then leave the environment on its own like that”, adding that the environment was like a child that needed to be tended.

He emphasised the need for substantial part of the land to be forested as according to him, the United Nations mandate requires that “every country and state should at least have 25 per cent of their land area being vegetated forest area” he revealed.

On the adverse effects of gas flaring on plant life, Prof. Chindah who holds a PhD in Marine Biology from the RSUST said that in areas were there are gas flares, crops were seem to be growing well but do not produce.

“If you go to Rumuekpe in Emohua Local Government Area of the state, from our study, the maize will be very high but it will not have crop and the same thing happens to human beings who all leave around the gas flare area”, he explained.

He further explained that a study carried out somewhere in the state show that a lot of farmers were suffering from what he described as a “glare-like effect where their eyes are open but they were not seeing”, he said.

“So those things are very serious. It is an effect on the farmers who live there and people who dwell and do business around the area where you have the gas flare”, he said.

On the effects oil spill has on farmlands and streams when in adequately cleaned, Prof. Chndah said the little streams the people use for fishing and surely the only source of drinking water are being polluted.

“For example, when it happened at Isiokpo sometime, the company concerned supplies water for a while and vanished leaving the people to suffer”, adding that government should empower her agencies to properly monitor and punish those found to have remerged on their operational obligations.

He believed that government has put in place the appropriate  laws to guide the companies in their operations but expressed that the government needed to adequately empower its agencies to enable them access areas through air and other means.

“Well government has taken a step  I would say, because they have  the penalties, they have the laws which the companies must abide to and so on, but then there is no will from government to make sure that these things are followed to the letter.

“The agencies that are supposed to make sure that these things are made right do not have the capacity”, he said.

According to Prof. Chindah, a honouree of the national merit award, member, order of the Federal Republic (MFR), the government  should be able to give the relevant agencies enough money to enable them monitor the companies.