FG approves contract for Nigeria-Cameroon link bridge

Construction of a Nigeria-Cameroon bridge has been approved by the Federal Government on Wednesday at a cost of $40 million.

According to The Independent, It also announced a bold plan to kick-off its green economic policy.

The decision followed a successful review of its National Policy on Environment formulated in 1991 and last revised in 1999.

The green policy initiative is aimed at reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities which in the long run promotes sustainable development without degrading the environment; it is closely related with ecological economics but has more politically applied focus.

According to the outgoing Minister of Environment, appointed recently as UN Deputy Secretary General, Amina Mohammed, Nigeria has had to revise the policy again in 2017 to capture emerging challenges regarding climate change, coastal erosion, desertification, erosion, pollution and insecurity which have been exacerbated by the struggles for environment resources, particularly in the Niger Delta.

“We took a memo to council for the revised National Policy on Environment which was first formulated in 1991 and last revised in 1999.

“The second revision is 2017. It has become imperative that we have this new policy framework because what we really wanted to do is to capture some of the emerging issues that have come since then as regards the environment.

“These concerns such as climate change, coastal erosion, desertification, erosion, pollution and insecurity which have been exacerbated by the struggles for environment resources, we see this in the country at all levels.

“What the policy does is to look at all the different inter-sectoral issues that we have, whether it is with water, health, power, agriculture and bring them in to have a multi-sectoral response”, she said.

According to Mohammed, “The policy went through an extensive stakeholder consultation; a greater part of the new policy environment sees partnership with the private sector and with the communities as absolutely essential to the sustainability of our environment.

“We also looked at the importance of funding of many of the issues that have come out, so the policy itself looks to find many ways, looking at innovative ways for financial framework to bring resources to the different aspects.

“However, the cost is usually not reachable for the majority of the people, so finding new ways of bringing that to fruition and making sure that the policy takes care of itself.

“There are many issues within the new policy environment that today many Nigerians are asking what we are doing about it. The regulatory agencies coming together to look at the issue of deforestation which is now at alarming rate which is below five percent, the issues of waste and how we can look at the producers responsibility, where we can see plastics actually recycled and not littering the environment.”

Beyond this, Mohammed also told State House correspondents, shortly after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting chaired by Acting President Yemi Osinbajo that the United Nation’s Security Council would be visiting Nigeria in no distant time.

She said when they visit, the presidency would seize the opportunity to highlight environmental challenges that cropped up as a result of terrorism that engulfed the North East, particularly the nexus between poverty, conflict and climate change.

“In the next two weeks or so, the UN Security Council would be visiting Nigeria and when it does, we will be showing them exactly what the president has been highlighting especially that nexus between poverty, conflict and climate change.

“They will visit the North East and they will see some of the root causes of our young people being dragged to a life of terrorism.

“We can talk about health and there is global fund and there are institutions in the UN that will help us to strengthen what is happening on nutrition on children, maternal health and several aspects which can be better coordinated,” Mohammed stated.

Source: The Independent