Experts urges FG to include climate change in education curriculum

Participants at a ‘National Conference on Climate Change, COP27 and Behold’ have urged the Federal Government to mainstream climate change as a subject into the nation’s educational curriculum.

This is contained in a communiqué signed by the Executive Director, Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA), Akinbode Oluwafemi, at the end of the two-day national conference in Abuja.

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The participants said that making the curriculum conventional became necessary as it would spur interest among the youth and breed a generation of environmentally conscious activists.

“Climate change must be mainstreamed into the country’s educational curriculum to spur interests among the youth and breed a generation of environmentally conscious activists.

“There is need to simplify the prevailing climate change policy documents for easy assimilation and engaging of the younger generation.

“We also underscore the need for trainings and capacitation of Nigerian journalists to report climate change in-depth, to expose false solutions and sustained spotlight on real solutions to the crisis.

“There is need for the formation of a Nigeria climate watchdog comprising frontline communities, civil society, development experts, the academia and the media, among other crucial stakeholders,” the communique said.

According to the communique, there is also need to protect the rights of the indigenous people, the original landowners whose culture and livelihood are being eroded.

It said, “The re-invention of the Nigeria Social Forum is important and the same must accommodate sub-demands in the environment and climate change space. Alliance building, partnerships, and engagement with the National Climate Change Council, the African Group of Negotiators, and the UNFCCC processes should be strengthened.”

The conference was convened based on the realization that climate change is an existential threat that affects Africa more than other regions of the world despite her being the least contributor to the crisis.

The keynote address, entitled Nigeria, COP27 and The Quest for Real Solutions delivered by Nnimmo Bassey, Executive Director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), who emphasized that, the yearly Conference of Parties (COPs) meetings have not achieved the purpose of holding the polluting rich countries and corporations accountable for climate change harms.

He said that instead, victim countries, especially in Africa are made to beg for climate finance with no success.

Bassey said that the COPs have been reduced to a gathering of the rich and highly placed at the expense of vulnerable communities and nations that bear the brunt of the climate crises.