Climate change impacts have taken their toll on the Nigerian Sahel communities of Toshua and Sansan,located in Geidam and Mobbar (Damasak) local government areas of Yobe and Borno states respectively.
Climate change impacts
have taken their toll on the Nigerian Sahel communities of Toshua and Sansan,located
in Geidam and Mobbar (Damasak) local government areas of Yobe and Borno states
respectively.
Desertification is
spreading like wild fire in this zone, and sand dunes are threatening people,
their livestock and other means of livelihood. The movement of sand dunes
caused by high winds and exacerbated by lack of tree cover has covered houses,
farmlands, oases and trees in these areas.
These communities,
however, are leaving no stone unturned as they harness their local technologies
to plant trees on the dunes in order to help stem the tide. The question is: how far can they go alone in this fight?
Thanks to the
Department of Forestry and Wildlife, University of Maiduguri that has teamed up
with the BNRCC, these challenges are being tackled through various climate
change adaptation measures. The project intends to implement the following
adaptation strategies in the two communities:
·
Plant
trees that have proven to be effective in stabilizing sand dunes and
controlling erosion;
·
Use
of biogas as an alternative to fuel wood;
·
Plant drought resistant crops;
·
The
use of water harvesting techniques from underground aquifers;
·
Improved
pasture production; and
·
Domestication
of wood production.
The University of Maiduguri team has started the process to
achieve these goals hand in hand with
the community members from Toshua and Sansan.
The BNRCC monitoring team came face to face with the reality of
the impacts in these communities during their monitoring visit to Northern
Nigeria recently.
For further information, please
contact Forestry and Wildlife department, University of Maiduguri or e-mail: unimaidforestry@yahoo.com
To view pictures of the sites
and the visit, see our photo gallery.
|
