Don warns of dangers of neglecting climate change
By Tunde Odesola, The Punch, 6 Jan 2009
The Co-Director, Centre for Applied Environmental Research, and Chair, Department of Geosciences, University of Missouri, Kansas City, Missouri in the United States of America, Prof. Jimmy Adegoke, has warned of the dangers posed by the neglect of climate change, noting that the third world may face serious challenges due to serious global depletion of water level.
Adegoke (File)
In a lecture on, “Global Climate and Environmental Change: Impacts on water resources and sensitive ecosystem in Nigeria,” at the Osun State University, Okuku campus, Adegoke said, “Lake Chad was once the 6th largest lake in the world. It has now declined to 1/10th of its size. The lake is an important life-sustaining system for over 20 million people spread over four countries. Water is next to air in importance in the ecosystem because it is a major component for life sustainability.”
Adegoke explained that every sector of the economy was vulnerable to climate change, stressing that the phenomenon could have grave consequences for humanity and the ecosystem if not urgently addressed.
He noted that the degradation of mangrove forest in the Niger Delta region of the country through gas flaring and other oil exploration activities was responsible for emission of greenhouse gases, rising temperature and loss of the forest in the south-west, south-east and north-west regions of the country.
The scholar also said that lowering the sea level as a result of loss of rain globally and the rising temperature had serious negative impact on agric, forest, water, ecosystem, health, communities, energy and commerce. “Political will is needed to develop policy instruments and the local technical capacity required to address the issues. We need to develop analytical and modeling systems for studying the impacts of regional climate change and local vulnerability,” he said.
Tracing the mean annual rainfall in the Sahel between 1897 and 1990, Adegoke posited that 1960 was the last year when rainfall was above average in the region.
He observed that universities and climate centres in Nigeria lacked modern instruments to measure climatic changes, saying his personal laboratory in the US had modern facilities for measuring changes in the climate.
He blamed the inadequate climate measuring equipment in the country on government, adding that Nigeria possessed competent human personnel that ranked among the best anywhere in the world.
He said, “Nigerian professionals beat their foreign counterparts whenever and wherever they are given the tools to work with. The inertia exhibited by our professionals back at home is not as a result of their colour, it’s because of lack of infrastructure. Government should develop human capacities by investing in people. It’s shameful that Nigeria is not measuring up to its potentials.”
Reminiscing on the quality of education available in the country in the 1960s and 1970s, Adegoke said he got the best of education at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria and the University of Ibadan, Ibadan.
He, however, said the eras of military despots signaled a decline in the education sector, revealing that this prompted him to seek greener pastures in the US.
Earlier, the Commissioner for Environment, Osun State, Mr. Kazeem Adio, had told the audience that the state government was keen on curbing environmental degradation.
Adio said government had begun to check erosion across the state’s three senatorial districts, adding that the ministry had forwarded a bill to the House of Assembly seeking to check environmental degradation.
“The government is conversant with the challenges posed by the changes in the ecosystem. The state government will not disappoint the citizenry in advancing practical solutions to environmental challenges.
We have initiated a tree planting programme in which we advocate that five trees must be planted where one is felled,’’ he said.
The Vice-Chancellor, UNIOSUN, Prof. Sola Akinrinade, said the institution established a centre for environmental studies in order to tackle the challenges posed by changes in climate.
He said, “We, at UNIOSUN, realise the enormity of the problems posed by environmental degradation. We are doing some research into the effects of climate change.
UNIOSUN is blazing the trail in this regard as the first university to engage in this kind of extensive academic endeavour.”
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