World Bank commences implementation of $700m environment project

The World Bank has commended the implementation of ACReSAL project worth 700m USD in 19 Northern states and FCT to reclaim land degradation in the region.

The disclosure was made by Abdulhamid Umar, the National Project Coordinator of the Agro-Climatic Resilience In Semi-Arid Landscape (ACReSAL) project, who led an assessment team to Bauchi.

Fielding questions from Journalists at the Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa International Airport on Thursday, the National Coordinator said that, “essentially, Bauchi is one of the 19 Northern states and FCT that the World Bank intervention has commenced.”

He added that “the sum of 700m USD is to be accessed by the 19 Northern states and FCT for the purposes of fighting issues surrounding desertification, drought, landscape degradation and deprivation at the level of communities and the land that we live in, particularly in the North.”

“So, we are here in Bauchi with the World Bank team, the lenders of the resources, for the purposes of assessing and reviewing implementation strategies that has started over one year ago to see to the extent how much has actually been achieved and what are the areas if any for corrections where such is to be done,” he said.

Abdulhamid Umar stressed, “That is the reason why we chose Bauchi as one of the states of the Federation and FCT to come over to see things for ourselves and I am happy to tell you that Bauchi falls under category B which are states that did not participate in the initial project but are leading the pack now.”

He explained that the project is to run for 6 years at the end of which it is expected that things would have turned around positively and the communities will be good for it.

The National Coordinator assured that the project will impact the lives of the people of the affected areas in the state positively as all degraded areas will be reclaimed.