The World Bank Group Board has approved a $700 million credit from the International Development Association (IDA) for the Nigeria Agro-Climatic Resilience in Semi-Arid Landscapes (ACReSAL) Project.
The Breton Woods institution in a statement indicated that the project would increase the implementation of sustainable landscape management practices in northern Nigeria and strengthen the country’s long-term enabling environment for integrated climate-resilient landscape management.
It noted that the productivity of major crops in Nigeria had been steadily declining over the past two decades, in part due to climate change, forcing an expansion of the area under agriculture and increased imports to meet the food needs of Nigeria’s growing population.
For instance, the bank noted that persistent water shortages, especially in the extreme north, continue to exacerbate land degradation, desertification, and habitat loss just as resource shortages, violent conflict, outdated agricultural systems not adapted to changing dryland conditions, lack of access to finance, weak value chain linkages, an uncompetitive environment for agribusiness, and poor market access are other key barriers to increased agricultural productivity in Nigeria.
As a strategic step towards mitigating the negative of the challenges on Nigeria’s agricultural production, the World Bank pointed out that better environmental and water resources management and resilience against disaster and climate risks (largely water-related) were needed to sustain economic growth and protect the most vulnerable.
It expatiated: “In recent years, the Government of Nigeria has established several initiatives in the agriculture sector to combat desertification including afforestation and reforestation programs, dissemination of proven agricultural technologies and sustainable agricultural practices, and promotion of efficient energy sources.
“Efforts to stop and reverse desertification are complicated by the need to feed a rapidly increasing population in a region where natural resources are dwindling and over 90 percent of national food production depends on smallholder farmers who lack the capacity to increase food production without degrading land”, the bank added.
Commenting on the challenges, World Bank Country Director for Nigeria, Shubham Chaudhuri, said: “Nigeria is faced with water scarcity and droughts which occur every five years, on average, with the potential to increase in frequency due to climate change. This scenario not only threatens food security, livelihoods, and productivity, but also exacerbates fragility and increases the risk of violence.
“With communities and households that are most dependent on natural resources for their survival and vulnerable to desertification, this intervention will improve multi-sectoral watershed planning and investments to help about 3.4 million direct beneficiaries adapt to evolving dryland conditions”, the banker added.
The ACReSAL Project is a 6-year strategic project prioritizing actions within four components: Dryland Management, Community Climate Resilience, Institutional Strengthening and Project Management, and Contingent Emergency Response.
The implementation will improve the capacity of the country to adapt to a changing climate, largely through enhancing multi-sectoral convergence (across environment, agriculture and water) and technology modernization, including improved use of data, analytics, and connectivity.
In her remarks, Task Team Leader, ACReSAL, World Bank, Joy Iganya Agene, further clarified: “The project will specifically target the inclusion of vulnerable and marginalized groups, including women, youth, the elderly, persons with disabilities, internally displaced people, and ethnic and religious minorities using an integrated watershed approach across sectors and levels of governance.
“This will help reduce the vulnerability of millions of the extreme poor in northern Nigeria, strengthening their own role in the management of their natural resources while also addressing land degradation, strengthening climate resilience, and lessening livelihood vulnerability in dry, semi-arid and dry sub-humid regions in the northern states”, Agene stressed.
