In lieu of its climate change initiative, the United Kingdom has made an announcement of an investment of up to £95million on climate resilient and sustainable agriculture which would be implemented in Nigeria.
James Cleverly who is the United Kingdom Foreign Secretary had made the pledge at the Conference of Parties (COP) 27 on Climate Change in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
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Propcom+ is a UK International Climate Finance (ICF) programme which is supporting the transformation of Nigeria’s rural economy and Cleverly had revealed that the intervention will enhance output, adapt and build resilience, and protect and restore nature.
At least 4 million Nigerians, including some of the 2 million women, will also be empowered to adjust to the effects of climate change while they would be reducing emissions.
Cleverly had also explained that the programme will help address key barriers to sustainable agricultural development in the country.
“It will support climate-resilient agricultural policies, actions, and investments that deliver nutrition, increase productivity, protect and restore natural ecosystems”, he disclosed.
The investment will adopt practices such as heat and flood-tolerant crop varieties and integrated soil fertility management.
In another report, Africa’s most populous country, Nigeria has been tagged as ‘extremely high risk’ of the impacts of climate change, ranking second out of 163 countries without
This was made known by UNICEF’s representative in Nigeria, Cristian Munduate, in a statement issued and signed by Geoffrey Njoku of the fund’s communication unit.
The statement reflected that children in ‘extremely high risk’ countries are most likely to be exposed to multiple climate and environmental shocks combined with high levels of underlying child vulnerability, due to inadequate essential services, such as water and sanitation, healthcare, and education.
It pointed out that more than 2.5 million people in Nigeria need humanitarian assistance, with 60 percent of them being children at increased risk of waterborne diseases, drowning, and malnutrition due to the flooding that has bedeviled the country.
It revealed that floods have affected 34 out of the 36 states in the country, have displaced 1.3 million people, over 600 lost their lives, and over 200,000 houses either partially or fully damaged.