FG determined to tackle environmental challenges —Minister

THE Minister of State for Environment, Mr  Ibrahim Usman Jibril, has reiterated that the Federal Government is determined to tackle the environmental challenges bedevilling the nation.

He spoke in Abuja at a dialogue with a United Nations delegation and stakeholders from both public and private sectors in the country.

The minister, who dissected the progress report from 2015 to date, in the area of investment and commitment of the government to environmental issues, said there was no part of Nigeria without environmental challenges in one way or the other.

He said the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) was initiated by the Federal government through the Federal Ministry of Budget and National Planning in an attempt to bring the economy back when the country went into recession.

He said the issue of environmental challenges was also adequately encapsulated in ERGP, being implemented across sectors of the economy.

He noted that environmental challenges cuts across the six geopolitical zones of the county, ranging from erosion, the rising sea level due to climate change and deforestation.

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Jibril said: “For our mandate, we are charged with protecting the national environment against pollution and degradation. We are also charged with the conservation of natural resources for sustaining the development and we are partnering with other government ministries, departments and agencies as well as private sectors, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and International organisations to achieve the mandate.

“The issue of land degradation is a serious problem in this country, particularly in the South East and South-South.

“We realised that ordinary budgetary allocation cannot help solve the problems, so, we had to go to the World Bank and we got a facility of 500 billion dollars. We started with about seven states and now cover 19 states across the country,” he said.

The head of UN delegation, Mr Erik Solhiem, stressed that one of the problems of the environment was that most people see environment and development as separate issues.

“Environment and development is one, it can not be separated,” he said.