The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has warned the country to brace up to increase food and water shortages due to frequent changes in weather patterns.
Thi was disclosed by the Director-General of the Agency, Air Vice Marshall Mohammadu Mohammed at a capacity building for NEMA and other stakeholders on Integrated Climate Change and COVID-19 vulnerability and adaptation planning for disaster risk management.
He added that Nigeria would continue to depend on subsistence agriculture due to climate change.
He said: “Increased drought in some regions will likely lead to land degradation, damage to crops or reduced yields, more livestock deaths, and an increased risk of wildfire. Such conditions will increase the risk for populations dependent on subsistence agriculture.”
According to the DG, the changing weather conditions,would further lead to food and water shortage and higher incidence of malnutrition, water-borne and food-borne diseases, and may also lead to displacements of population.
Mohammed stated that the risk and dynamics of the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change vulnerability have given the warning that nigerians have to publicly adapt to the new situation or we suffer the devastating consequences. He also added there would be increase in flood.
Also, the International Federation of Red Cross Society has revealed that no fewer than 158 fatalities were recorded across 22 states during the 2020 flood disaster that ravaged the country.
The ECOWAS Commissioner for Social Affairs and Gender, Dr. Fatima Jagne, WHO quoted the statistics, expressed worry over the development, she said Nigeria is the worst affected country in the region with natural disaster and human-induced calamity, as the combination of the disasters has led to huge economic losses and avoidable human death.
She lamented that countries in the West African region were currently grappling with multiple challenges of various risk disasters caused by climate especially in the vulnerable communities, adding that the condition was further aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
She implored ECOWAS member states to be more responsible in the protection of lives and properties of their citizen, and in serving the needs of their population before and after the disaster.
