The minister of Environment, Dr. Mohammad Mahmood Abubakar has approved 17 memoranda aimed to promote environmental sustainability in COVID-19 era.
Abubakar made this approval during the 14th Meeting of the National Council on Environment (NCE) held in Abuja on the April 9.
The meeting, with the theme “Managing Emerging Environmental Challenges: Need for Strategic Approach to Sustainable Development in Covid-19 Era and Beyond”, was convened virtually for participants from the 36 States.
The council which was chaired by the Minister, presented a total of 47 Memoranda to the Council after which the Council approved 17 action Memoranda, stepped down 19 and took note of 11 Memoranda.
In a communique made available by the Ministry’s Director of Press to NatureNews on Monday, the council resolved to shift from the current linear economic model, which is based on resource extraction, production, distribution, consumption and waste generation to a new circular economic model( which is based on sharing, leasing, reusing, repairing, refurbishing and recycling existing materials and products as long as possible).
It also resolved that Government at all levels should ensure that our environmental management/protection efforts are geared towards empowering the most vulnerable groups, particularly our youths and women, to create job/employment opportunities for them, in line with the Federal Government’s agenda of lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty within the next 10years.
According to the minister, such programmes to be pursued in collaboration with the private sector and development partners would include waste to wealth, afforestation/reforestation, agro-based/smart agricultural projects etc.
Among other resolutions by the council include; the need for a stronger synergy between the National Assembly, the Federal Ministry of Environment and critical Stakeholders towards ensuring a more robust legislative process that would drive environmental policies, programmes and projects implementation.
“The need to support the ratification of the National Framework for the Application of Climate Services (NFACS) jointly presented by the Ministries of Environment, Agriculture and Aviation on the heels of a presidential directive to the Federal Executive Council (FEC). The ratification will ensure that climate information was made seamlessly available to all citizens especially the bottom-most affected to get valuable information to avert unwanted situations.
“The need to fully operationalize the national GHG inventory management system for sustainable data collection at state levels and all sectors and to accommodate the carbon registry.”
