The programme which aims at fighting desert encroachment in the affected areas, is receiving a boost to help accommodate the projection of the federal government, which is for the programme to benefit over 40 million people in the northern parts of the country.
The president said the implementation of the GGW is to enhance the economic transformation of the nation and improve the livelihoods of the citizenry which requires that the risks and vulnerabilities in the drought and desertification affected states are addressed.
He said the GGW will cover about 1,500km-long (East-West) and 2km-wide (North-South) parts of the country, using both economic and forest tree species to be based on community-driven, integrated rural development approach as agreed for the Nigeria segment.
“The idea is that the project will principally check the advancement of desertification and erosion as well as restore eco-balance even as it creates sustainable jobs for thousands of our youths who are without jobs,” he said.
He noted that GGW will be a vehicle in the determination to eliminate poverty, and create wealth for the people and help to reduce unemployment and rehabilitate over two million hectares of degraded land and improve agricultural productivity.
The Minister of Environment, Mrs. Laurentia Mallam, also noted that the project will positively enhance the livelihoods of residents in the affected states, as desert encroachment was becoming a menace in the areas.
Mallam said the project will provide shelter cover for the affected communities and will create an ozone friendly environment in the region.
She noted that 5,000 additional jobs were targeted by the GGW project in each of the affected states, and this will include jobs for tree planters, forest guards and citizens who sell vegetables.
She said: “Mr. President has provided funds for the 2015 framework. So all together he has provided N16 billion for this project.
“Since trees take carbon dioxide from the air, planting large scale trees will help absorb excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, thereby contributing its quota in checking ozone depletion and global warming.”
Mouktar Lugga, Commissioner for Environment, Zamfara State and Chairman, Nigerian Frontline States Action Initiatives on Desertification (NIFSAID) said the beauty of the GGW is that it has actually created a lot of jobs for people within the host communities and reduced the rural urban drift experienced before.
He said: “After harvesting season, lots of young men go into cities to look for menial jobs but right now this programme is employing them and they are remaining within their communities.”
According to Lugga, many people look at the programme as mere tree planting campaign but it is not; it is a whole economic programme targeted to settle, rehabilitate and to revamp the economy around the fringes of northern Nigeria.
“You are going to see a lot of programmes coming that will point to the fact that northern Nigeria is actually going back to the period of economic boom,” he added.
He noted that the programme has started impacting on the youths as hundreds of both men and women actually took part in the planting of the trees and serving as forest guards to better their economic status.
He said NIFSAID, an umbrella association for the 11 frontline states’ Commissioners for Environment, formed in 2011 agitated for the realisation of the GGW which believes that as an umbrella, they will be able to collectively tackle environmental problems. They also sought to use it as a pressure group to get policy makers, federal government and other bodies to look into their unique environmental problem.
Speaking on the benefits of the programme, Commissioner for Environment, Kebbi State, Mr. Ishaku Daudu, said it is going to create jobs, empower the youths and women and raise their standard of living.
He said each LGA is divided into local communities and in each community, the federal government has employed about eight youths some of them NCE holders and sent them to Kano for training and that about 432 youths have been employed to serve as forest guards.
According to him, on completion they are sent back to their communities in uniform to ensure the protection of the trees and they are paid salary of between N18 to N25,000 per month.
He said the federal government earmarked an area for vegetable production in the orchard and involved women in the process from which they harvest and sell keeping the proceeds for their empowerment.
“Our women have started enjoying the dividend of the project; they have started selling their vegetables and the money goes back to them,” he said.
He revealed that the women have been trained in petty handworks, such as how to make beads, perfume, pomade and extract oil from groundnut. “They are virtually on their own as they have been taught how to do all these things and by so doing the federal government has introduced a means of livelihood for the youth, women and elders,” he said.
According to the community leader of Bachaka, Yakubu Maiyaki Tsamiya, the host communities contributed by allowing the use of their farms without compensation because they know the value of the project and the benefit that will accrue from it.
He said the community is very grateful for the development brought about by the project such as access road and water as they are making the best use of the water so provided.
He however appealed to Mr. President to assist them in the provision of mobile phone services to help them connect with the rest of the people and also to intensify action on actualising the solar electricity promised.
Dr. Newton Jibunoh, founder of Fight Against Desert Encroachment (FADE) and member of GGW Council said the programme is a right approach to fight desertification and a positive development to put structures in place which he has been advocating for in the past 40 years.
Speaking on sustainability of the programme, he said community involvement approach is needed to achieve result.
“You have to get the community involved and find ways of letting them know that it belongs to them not the federal government, so that they can take charge and become partners in development.”
He observed that putting sustainable infrastructure like water is important to nurture the plants, especially now that they are planting at the end of the rainy season.
Money, according to him, is important as the project needs to be followed with expenditure that has to be well calculated and monitored so the programme doesn’t fall apart.
He noted that the N16 billion expended so far by the federal government is no where near what is needed to make the project work considering the extent of the encroachment.
“Looking at 40 years ago and the problems that I have seen you will know that N16 billion will not do. I wish that amount of money was expended when I started, we won’t be where we are today,” he said.
On job creation, he said the project by the calculation of Nigerian Society of Engineers will provide more than 1.5 million jobs.
“You can imagine if you are able to green the area, stop encroachment, migration, start building communities, create movement of goods and services and calculate the kind of employment that will come with such services, it is not a minor thing,” he said
He pointed out that if desertification is not stopped, there is no way to implement all these, “so we have to first of all recover the land from the Sahara, so you will not only be creating employment but you will be solving so many issues like security.”
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