Nigeria Loses 400,000 Hectares Of Forest Annually – Experts

Nigeria is losing about 3.5 per cent of its forest, or between 350,000 and 400,000 hectares to deforestation and other economic activities such as logging on an annual basis, conservation experts have said.

According to the experts, who spoke at the 14th S. L. Edu Annual Memorial Lecture organised by the Nigerian Conservation Foundation in Lagos, the country’s forest area has been on a constant decline, since 1970.

The current figure, according to the conservationists, indicates that the country’s forest reserves currently stand at 5.04 per cent of the total land mass.

They added that the country needed to invest heavily in the forest sector in order to harness its huge potential in addressing emerging environmental, social and economic challenges.

A Professor of Forest Economy and President, Forestry Association of Nigeria, Labode Popoola, who delivered the lecture, said while the world lost 3.3 per cent of its forest between 1990 and 2005, Nigeria had lost 21 per cent of its reserves.

Popoola noted that the heavy demand for construction wood and other purposes by wood-based industries had encouraged logging, leading to large-scale deforestation.

He said that the Federal Government’s budget for forestry had dropped to only two per cent of the total annual allocation of public funds, while state governments had continued to generate revenue from uncontrolled logging.

The FAN president said, “Nigeria is blessed with a large expanse of land and different vegetation but this important resource is not sustainably used or managed.

“Some state governments are removing the protected area status of forest estates without regard for the law establishing such estates.”

The professor stated that forests remained Nigeria’s most under-valued resource and that with continuing degradation, its economic opportunities would be lost.

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A former Special Adviser to the Federal Government on Economic Matters and President, NCF, Chief Philip Asiodu, said over 90 per cent of the country’s rural population depended on forests for survival yet, there were still policy and legal framework gaps in assigning full economic value to the ecosystem.

He added, “Putting a price tag on nature is acknowledging a societal reality to which decision makers will pay attention.

“Economic valuation of nature can be useful in providing the basis to justify and set priorities for programmes, policies and actions that protect or restore the ecosystem and their services.”

The Chairman, National Executive Council, NCF, Chief Ede Dafinone, noted that there was a need for proper economic valuation of Nigeria’s forests, adding that the foundation would work to support the enforcement of the ban on the export of logs.

The Director-General, Mr. Adeniyi Karunwi, said the foundation, with the support of Chevron, aimed to bring attention to the economic value of forests so as to restore and regenerate the country’s lost forests for economic prosperity.

—Punchng