ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION IN NIGERIA AND MANAGEMENT PROSPECTS
Uzoigwe Kingsley Chukwuemeka, Kostyuchenko Nadiya
Sumy State University, Ukraine
Environmental degradation is the deterioration of the environment through depletion of resources such as air, water and soil; the destruction of ecosystems and the extinction of wildlife.
The environment surrounds and affects man, while man also affects the environment. In view of the fact that man affects the environment, the responsibility of taking purposeful collective action that may harmonise human existence with the rest of the environment falls on man.
Nigeria, a rapidly urbanizing and industrializing society, is currently faced with many environmental problems. As a result of rapid urbanization and industrialization, there is an increased demand for goods, land services, thereby leading to irretrievable changes in physical landscape. The two most important of the numerous problems resulting from the urbanization of water basins, are floods and pollution. Construction of roads, houses and industrial buildings causes environmental problems.
That’s why a comprehensive environmental planning/management strategy is extremely needed.
There are three major threats to effectively managing Nigeria’s environment:
1)The unsustainable use of renewable natural resources.
The lack of inadequacy in management of natural resources by the government, having been making huge money from all those natural resources, but has failed to maintain the environments where those natural resources in been located.
2)Unplanned urban development.
The failure of the government to enforce at the initial stage the full master plan of the urban development programme, has resulted to a massive demolition of properties and this demolition has caused many environmental hazards to the citizenry.
3)Petroleum industry operations.
The petroleum industry has also contributed to the environmental problems faced by Nigerians. The inability of oil refineries to implements the environmental policies approved by the government of Nigeria has made the environment, where those oil refineries is situated, infertile.
To plan for effective activities and to manage the environment in a more sustainable manner, the Government of Federal Republic of Nigeria (GFRN) needs to address and mitigate these threats and the underlying causes of environmental degradation: increasing poverty, population growth and migration, and political and institutional constraints. To help improve environmental management and governance priority actions are to be made in the areas of:
1)Legal and policy reform.
Although the federal framework needs work in some areas, it is the states, due to the highly varied nature of the most pressing environmental threats they face, that need to be empowered to develop and enforce legislation promoting sustainable use of environmental resources. Sectoral policies are highly centralized and also suffer from lack of coordination. There‘s needs to be an integrated, multisectoral approach to policy development and implementation at both the national and state levels.
2)Economic incentives.
In Nigeria, the lack of effective resource valuation has strong negative impacts on the management of renewable natural resources and on the sustainable use of water and soils that effect overall quality and production potential. More complete knowledge of markets, better access to markets and use options for resources and their associated risks are unknown, or incomplete. There is considerable room for improvement in just about every economic activity that depends on clean and abundant sources of water, fertile soil, protection of infrastructure and populations from erosion, construction material from trees, food from plants and animals, etc.