Chuks Oyema-Aziken
The Director General, National Agency for the Great Green Wall, Yusuf Maina-Bukar has pledged his support and commitment towards the realisation of the World Bank-sponsored Agroclimatic Resilience in Semi-Arid Landscapes (ACReSAL) Project.
He gave the pledge when the ACReSAL team led by Dr. Joy Iganya Agene, Senior Environmental Specialist World Bank -Task Team Leader and Engr. Anda Ayuba Yalaks, Ag. National Project Coordinator paid him a courtesy visit in his office in Abuja.
He said the mission of the NAGGW is to halt and reverse land degradation, prevent depletion of biological diversity, ensure that by 2025, ecosystems are resilient to climate change and continue to provide essential services that would contribute to human welfare and poverty eradication.
He said NAGGW is saddled with the responsibility of discouraging desertification and land degradation, in eleven States in the North: Sokoto, Kebbi, Kastina, Zamfara, Kano, Jigawa, Bauchi, Gombe, Yobe, Borno and Adamawa.
He assured aa the team of his support especially in the area of oasis management and development, and sand dunes fixation which will be done in a manner that will make a great difference- all through the season.
On her part, Dr. Joy Agene said the familiarization visit is to leverage on the experience and expertise of the National Agency for the Great Green Wall as a critical stakeholder in the implementation of ACReSAL Project.
She noted that land degradation is a serious challenge in the entire Northern states, not only in the eleven frontline states hence the need for the partnership with NAGGW and from the ACReSAL Project Implementation Manual (PAD) it is very obvious that NAGGW is very important to the project.
She further stated that ACReSAL need the NAGGW to achieve its objective especially the restoration of 1million ha and the NAGGW also needs ACReSAL to achieve its mandate. She said ACReSAL has a budget designated for NAGGW and again, the Agency’s technical input will be highly needed in the ongoing collaboration between ACReSAL and, Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nation (FAO) on drought and desertification.
In his remarks, Engr. Anda Ayuba Yalaks, the Ag. NPC ACReSAL, noted that the visit was to have good interface with the Agency with the view to seeking ways of working together, to know what the Agency is doing, where the activity is taken place in order to upscale the target. He said that ACReSAL has made a commitment to restore 1m ha, therefore there is need for synergy to avoid duplication of function rather to add value to ongoing activities order to achieve general objectives.
The Ag. NPC disclosed that NAGGW is key to ACReSAL project in terms of landscape restoration and the ACReSAL will also support the Agency where there is a gap, in the areas of capacity strengthening etc. He noted that we intend to develop a national portal, domiciled in the Agency for the purpose of reporting where all MDAs activities under landscape restoration will be documented.
