On 17 August, Nigeria hosted the 10th National Council on Environment in Nigeria with the participation of over 600 senior government delegates and development partners including UNDP Country Office and UN-REDD Programme team.
The Council meeting acknowledged the importance of REDD+ as a vehicle and innovative approach for addressing the challenges of deforestation and forest degradation in Nigeria. The week long meeting is held under the theme, Environment and Sustainable Development Goals in Nigeria – Empowering people, Taking Climate Action and Protecting the Environment. The Nigeria Council on Environment is a decision making body on Environment in Nigeria.The Nigeria Council on Environment was hosted by the Honorable Minister for Environment, Her Excellency, Amina Mohammed and His Excellency Umaru Tanko Al-Makura, Governor of Nassarawa State.
In her opening address, Minister Amina Mohammed underscored efforts by Government to curb deforestation as Nigeria is loosing 1.5 million tress a day as a result of illegal logging, increase in fuel wood use and other drivers of deforestation. These efforts have included finding alternatives to fuelwood use and suspending semi-processed wood.
In his Keynote address, the Governor of Nassarawa State,specifically acknowledged REDD+ as instrumental and catalytic in addressing the deforestation and forest degradation challenge. In addition, Ms. Mandisa Mashologu, UNDP Deputy Country Director, Programmes, re-iterated the UN’s continuous support to Nigeria’s efforts in developing REDD+ Strategies at National and State levels, that would provide the vision of how Nigeria wants to address REDD+ in an innovative and transformational manner as part of Nigeria’s green development pathways.
“The presentation and discussion on REDD+ is part of continuous efforts to galvanize the needed support in mainstreaming REDD+ into key national policy and development processes and as well seek support for Nigeria to transition from REDD+ Readiness to implementation.”
Speaking at the Council meeting yesterday- the Director of Forestry of the Federal Ministry of Environment, Mr. Phillip Bankole, underscored the strategic importance of REDD+ in Nigeria and highlighted the progress that Nigeria has made towards developing elements of the Warsaw Framework, including a National Framework Strategy on REDD+ and a REDD+ Strategy for Cross River State, and a National Forest Monitoring System. He argued “the presentation and discussion on REDD+ is part of continuous efforts to galvanize the needed support in mainstreaming REDD+ into key national policy and development processes and as well seek support for Nigeria to transition from REDD+ Readiness to implementation.”
Earlier in the week, the UN-REDD mission met with Dr. Bukar Hassan, Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Environment and discussed the strategic areas of co-operation on Nigeria’s readiness programme including the development of a National Framework Strategy on REDD+ and a REDD+ Strategy for Cross River State. Other topics included the transitional plan for Nigeria to support the transition from readiness to implementation, development of capacity building programmes to support REDD+ implementation including through South-to-South exchanges, and coordination of efforts amongst key partners supporting REDD+.
The mission was in Nigeria to support the validation meeting for Analytic Studies Reports towards REDD+ Strategy development. It is expected that Nigeria will develop a framework for National REDD+ Strategy as well as a REDD+ Strategy at the Cross River State level through participatory processes by the end of 2016. The Strategy will comprise policy reforms, investment priorities, and a related REDD+ implementation framework, with due monitoring and safeguard systems, as called for under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Consequently, several analyses have been designed to feed into the formulation of Issues and Options paper and an eventual REDD+ strategy and future REDD+ implementation.
For more information, resources and news from the UN-REDD Programme in Nigeria, visit the country page.
View photos from the event here.
For more information please contact Ela Ionescu at ela.ionescu@un-redd.org
