No country can confront climate change alone – Buhari
President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday said no country can confront climate change alone, urging UN-member countries to rededicate themselves to the task of rebuilding and restoring a healthy environment for future generations.
In an address to the opening session of United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP24) in Poland, he warned that the challenges of climate change, including rising temperatures, desertification, floods, low agricultural yields and drying up of water bodies, are enormous and evident to all.
Citing the receding Lake Chad, he noted that the effects of climate change are felt more on the vulnerable communities who lacked the capacity and technology to properly address such challenges.
“Obviously, no country can confront the phenomenon alone. In this regard, Nigeria believes in joint and cooperative efforts to tackle the problem,” the president was quoted as saying in a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu.
Speaking specifically on Lake Chad, the President reaffirmed that Nigeria remains committed to saving the Lake, which is a source of livelihood to 40 million people, from extinction.
He said Nigeria would build on the success of an International Conference held earlier in February this year in Abuja to create additional awareness globally on the serious environmental and security challenges facing the Lake Chad region.
The President told COP 24 Summit, attended by world leaders and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres that a consensus was reached at the Abuja Conference that an inter-basin water transfer from the Congo Basin remains the most sustainable option available to resuscitate and safeguard this precious water body that was once the 6th largest fresh water Lake in the world.
On behalf of the Member Countries of the Lake Chad Basin Commission, the President thanked the Italian Government for donating 1.5 million Euros towards completion of the feasibility studies on the proposed inter-basin water transfer project.
President Buhari also used the occasion to highlight what Nigeria had done and is doing on climate change after the adoption of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change in 2015.
“We in Nigeria have commenced the implementation of our Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“In the next 15 years, we aim to achieve 20% emissions reduction below Business as Usual (BAU) and 45% emissions reduction with the support of our international partners by 2030,” he said.
The President pledged that Nigeria will continue to pursue industrialization and economic development, with sound environmental management and best practices.
He added that Nigeria has unlocked the potential of its sovereign green bond to galvanize private capital to finance environmentally sustainable projects.
At the formal opening of COP24, President Andrzej Duda of Poland had told delegates that the conference is taking place on the exact location where a coal mine was once operated, adding that Katowice is now one of the greenest cities in Poland.