‘Great Green Wall’Il Mitigate Climate Change Effects’

The Director-General, National Agency for Great Green Wall (NAGGW), Goni Ahmed, says the development of the contiguous green belt in Northern Nigeria will aid efforts to combat climate change effects.
Ahmed, who said this in an interview with newsmen in Abuja, noted that the shelterbelt ‘‘is also part of the Continental Great Green Wall that stretches from Senegal to Djibouti.’’
He said the 1,500- km long and 15-km wide Green Wall would make life more conducive for the people in the 11 frontline states.
According to him,  “wall of trees’’, from Kebbi State in the Northwest to Borno State in the Northeast, was one of the projects aimed at improving the resilience of humans and natural systems in the country.
”The contiguous Green Wall cuts across the 11 frontline states,  Kebbi, Sokoto, Zamfara, Katsina, Jigawa, Yobe, Bauchi, Gombe, Kano, Adamawa and Borno,  and it will improve the livelihoods of people in the area.
”This will, in the wider sense, also help in the protection of both tangible and intangible rural heritage, which will lead to sustainable land management and balancing of the ecosystem,’’ he said.
”The wall will rehabilitate degraded lands, protect and improve the quality of farmlands, increase vegetation cover, improve biodiversity and combat climate change in general.
”It will also protect human settlements and infrastructure, stabilise shifting sand and enhance rural livelihoods,’’ he added.
Ahmed said that the country’s growing desertification was a reality which required affirmative action to instigate palliative measures that could improve the living standards of the affected communities.
”In addition, areas affected by desertification usually become useless to the inhabitants, as there will be great reduction in agricultural productions, while increasing exposure to risks of natural disasters like flooding.
”This forces people to move to better yielding areas for survival, which leads to competition and sometimes, overpopulation of certain areas, causing imbalance in population distribution,’’ he said.
Ahmed said that desertification was one of the most serious environmental challenges facing the country, adding that the geographical phenomenon not only affected land surfaces but also the soil and organisms beneath the soil.