ABUJA – The National Orientation Agency (NOA) on Tuesday urged the Federal Government to implement projects and programmes that would help to mitigate the impact of climate change in the country.
Dr Akindeji Falaki, the team Leader, Climate Change of the agency, made the call when he spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja.
The Climate Change and Environment Unit of NOA was established in May 2013, with the mandate to create environmental awareness in the country.
Falaki said that the government should, among other things, shift from fossil fuel to renewable energy in its quest to address the energy challenge.
“Why should we be depending on fossil fuel where countries of the World are moving away from it to renewable energy?’’ he asked.
Falaki advised the federal government to review its proposed policy of using coal to produce 30 per cent of electricity in the country by 2015.
“Why should we be depending on coal when countries of the world are moving away from fossil fuel to renewable energy?” he asked.
He said that NOA would soon adopt an environmental procurement policy to prevent the purchase and use of unfriendly appliances in the country.
Falaki said that the policy would be implemented under the agency’s Green Office Programme, advocating environmental friendly activities.
He said one of the propelling philosophies of the policy was to translate office atmosphere into an environmental friendly way in the use of water, electricity and electronic appliances, among others.
“If the equipment is not energy saving, the only way is to control it at the point of procurement.
“So, if we tell people to use environmental friendly appliances and procurement keeps buying unfriendly appliances; we will not get it right.
“We need to contain it from that point and we are doing all of that already. [eap_ad_1] “The vision is to get all our 36 offices and Abuja, and to get public offices to pay attention to environmental footprint of their office work.
“Footprint of their offices such as the use of paper; like five years ago this country launched e-governance to encourage the use of internet.
“Billions of Naira have been spent on the galaxy backbone for the project, yet people still use paper anyhow,’’ he said.
Falaki, however, commended the Federal Ministry of Environment on the implementation of Basel Convention; a treaty aimed at addressing transportation of hazardous waste between borders.
According to him, Nigerians need to change their orientation about the use of second-hand goods, known as “Tokunbo” and learn to buy environmentally friendly products.
Falaki also said that the agency had been creating awareness on the impact of some of the environmental practices that were harmful to the people.
On flooding, he said the agency had been creating awareness in communities for people to take precautions to prevent flooding.
“We all need to do the right thing to prevent flooding; people should make sure that drainage areas are not blocked and they should keep their environment clean,’’ he said. ((NAN)
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