World Day to Combat Desertificationby | 22-12-2016 02:23 |
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On every 17 June is the World Day to Combat Desertification under the United Nations Conventions to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and had been observed since 1995. The aim is to promote public awareness on desertification and drought and bringing together major stakeholders affected by the environmental issue to find novel solutions on how to curb it. This is usually achieved by a strong collaboration of the government and private. Desertification is detrimental of climate change and has caused a lot of anguish on the people especially in the developing nations as a result of famine. Till today, there is no significant improvement in combating desertification even with the help of funds that had been allocated to it. A case study in the Northern Nigeria shows it has been estimated that between 50 and 75% of states of Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, jigawa, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Sokoto, Yobe, and Zamfara are being affected by varying degrees of desertification and increasing desert encroachments. Yet, the government has not tackled the issue even though there is a yearly budget to curb desertification in those states. The plethora of factors that contributed to the deleterious effects of climate change like desertification has been highlighted to us yet no steer of alacrity and political will to counter it. Desertification can only be curbed when the government pays keen interest in it by engaging professionals in the field on the best methods to solve the environmental problem. The government should encourage ubiquitously agricultural practices among the citizens especially the states prone to desertification. Irrigation farming should also be encouraged and the government should support farmers in buy inventories thereby making it easier to adapt to the new practices. People should be motivated to conserve energy by opting to renewable sources of cooking thereby reducing the over-dependence on fossil and wood fuels producing greenhouse gasses. It is very feasible to curb desertification and I hope the next event in 2017 will bring more effective means, methods, and pay more attention toward achieving afforestation in the world. Reference: academicjournals.org/journal/JENE/article-full-text-pdf/4505E2154369 http://www2.unccd.int/
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