GGW Day: Dr. Bukar Highlights NAGGW’s Strides in Tackling Nigeria’s Deforestation

GGW Day: Dr. Bukar Highlights NAGGW’s Strides in Tackling Nigeria’s Deforestation

The National Agency for the Great Green Wall, NAGGW, has launched various programmes in recent years to help address deforestation and other environmental challenges worsening climate change in the country.

Dr. Yusuf Maina Bukar, the Director General of the Agency, made this known on the occasion of the maiden Great Green Wall (GGW) Day, which was commemorated in Nigeria, yesterday. The event was themed: “PLANT A TREE” and “SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT”.

To be celebrated every July 13, the GGW Day is a day on which Mr. President, Ministers, Chairman and members of the NAGGW Governing Council, together with Governors of the 11 frontline States, international partners and key stakeholders, among others, go out to plant trees in the 11 frontline States and the FCT.

The exercise is an effective PR, enlightening, sensitization and mobilization campaign that will promote the PAGGW initiative and educate Nigerians on the activities of the NAGGW on the benefits of ‘planting a tree’ to combat desertification and other climate-related challenges.

Vice President Kashim Shettima and the First Lady, Sen. Oluremi Tinubu, flagged off the inaugural GGW Day celebration, with the symbolic planting of trees, at the Presidential Villa.

At the Aso Rock Villa, Dr. Maina Bukar, who unveiled a cutting-edge technology to be deployed in tackling Nigeria’s deforestation crisis, said the Great Green Wall (GGW) is envisioned to be “the largest living structure on the planet, one that stretches 8,000km across Africa, ushering in a new era of sustainability and economic growth.

He said: “In Nigeria, the National Agency for the Great Green Wall (NAGGW), under the Federal Ministry of Environment, was established by Act of Parliament in 2015, to pursue the laudable vision of the African Union and its Heads and State of Governments when they adopted and launched the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and Sahel Initiative (GGWSSI) in 2007”.

According to the NAGGW Director General: “The Agency has since 2015 made a considerable progress in adapting and mitigating to the impact of emerging climate change risks in the frontline states of Borno, Yobe, Jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Zamfara, Sokoto, Kebbi, Bauchi, Gombe and Adamawa, by sequestering Carbon dioxide (CO2) in our shelterbelt plantation, woodlot plantation, orchard plantation, Gum Arabic (acacia) plantation, indigenous tree plantation, social forestry, farm forestry, institutional planting, and by large scale restoration of forest lands. It has also intervened directly by providing and empowering the women and the vulnerable living within and near its GGW corridor.

“As part of the commemoration of the Great Green Wall Day, we are going to demonstrate the use of a Dutch invention, known as the Groasis Waterboxx that assures a 90% survival rate for plant seedlings. The Waterboxx functions as a plant incubator, sheltering both the newly planted seedling and the ground around it from the heat of the sun, while providing water for the plant. The lid collects water from rain and nighttime condensation, which is then stored in the bucket”.

The Vice President, in his keynote address, observed that: “The world as we know it has been changing. Our temperatures are becoming extreme. Our rivers are drying up. Our wildlife has become endangered and our forests are thinning out.

“We are not only at the mercy of a world with inadequate green landscapes, but we are also forced to migrate towards greener pastures. The frightening reality is why we are gathered here today; this is what has inspired the GGW project.

“We are the silver lining in this search for a green and benign world; one that guarantees food security and prevents climate-induced migration.’’

Shettima recalled that Nigeria, through the Federal Ministry of Environment, took up the challenge to partake in the Pan-African mission to save the world.

He said: “I appeal to all of us to see this initiative as an emergency rescue operation. We inherited a dream that we cannot afford to relegate because doing so is not even an option.

“Our predecessors were aware of the danger ahead; and the burden is upon us now to pursue this mission as a life-saving mission and we must carry all stakeholders along to achieve this”.

The Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Environment, Alh. Ibrahim Yusufu Idris, in his welcome address, said there is the need to foster increased mobilization and sensitization campaigns on ecological challenges such as drought, desertification, land degradation as well as climate change.

To achieve this, aggressive afforestation and reforestation activities are desirable at national and sub-national levels, he noted.

Alh. Yusufu Idris, further said: “Since the Pan African Agency of the Great Green Wall (PAGGW) has directed Member Countries participating in the implementation of the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and Sahel Initiative (GGWSSI) to observe a dedicated day for more awareness creation, this informs the gathering here today to witness the first edition of Nigeria’s celebration of the GGW Day”.

Signed:
Mrs. Sule Pauline
Head, Press, Protocol and Public Relations Unit of NAGGW.

14th July 2023.