The Director of Planning, Research and Statistics, Enugu State Ministry of Environment and Mineral Resources has called on the UNDP Mr Evaristus Asadu, to help in controlling flooding and erosion.

Asadu made the call in an interview with newsmen in Abuja on Thursday.

He said that the support of the UNDP to check the devastating effects of flooding and erosion in the state would be felt greatly.

The director commended the UNDP for its contribution in the areas of environment statistics.

Asadu also commended the initiative of the Federal Ministry of Environment in collaborating with the UNDP on the issue.

He described the initiative as a good international partnership which would help in capacity building.

“Actually, it is a good international partnership because these are the area we really need them to partner with us not only in capacity building.

“Environmental statistics is the most important aspect of environment. Without statistics, we cannot go anywhere we need to collect data, we need to analyse data.

“We need to know what we are going to plan on because planning based on fake information gives you a fake policy decision and eventually the decision might crash.

“And it will end up not yielding any fruit on environment.

“So as far as Enugu state is concerned, I think we need statistics on environment and this is a stepping stone whereby we can build our own environmental statistics in Enugu state,’’ he further stated.

Asadu was participating in a two-day National Conference/Consultative Meeting on the UN Revised Framework for the Development of Environment Statistics.