Loss of forest area: UN director exonerates FRIN, National Parks Service

Nigeria is number four on the list of top 10 countries reporting the greatest annual net loss of forest area, with an annual forest area net loss of 410,000 hectares.

However, the relevant government agencies and institutions including the Nat

ional Parks Service and the Forestry Institute of Nigeria (FRIN) are not to blame.

This is according to the Professor LabodePopoola, Director, UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Nigeria.

The professor who is also the Vice Chancellor, Osun State University, Osogbo, instead laid the blame on the failure of members of the general public to engage in sustainable practices such as tree-planting.

Delivering the lead paper at the ninth annual conference of the Institute of Ecology and Environmental Studies, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, last week, the professor of Forest Economics and Sustainable Development insisted that these government bodies were doing their best, but needed the cooperation of the public to deliver on their mandate.

Professor Popoola told Ecoscope that “it is not FRIN that is destroying the forests; it is not the National Parks Services that is destroying the forests. It is you and I. We should be planting trees. Imagine if you plant a tree every year when you mark your birthday, if you live up to 70 and you are 30 now, you would have lanted 40 trees. We are too destructive, we are too wasteful. Those who are destroying the forests are not researchers. They are not necessarily the policy makers. They are people like you and I. FRIN is trying its best, other organisations are also doing their best. But the people are the problem.”

He went on to say that it was not necessary to create more agencies for sustained awareness on environmental issues to be achieved. “We already have too many of them. All we need to do is collective action, collective affirmation, and individually we must buy into everything that is good that will help this country to develop.”

Statistics put the annual rate of forest loss in Nigeria at 5 per cent.