The Guardian Nigeria News
November 14, 2021
Covid-19 and climate change are two unprecedented challenges for all of us. While we now rightly focus on containing the virus, addressing the immediate health crisis and limiting the economic damages, we also need to start tracking our way out of the crisis towards recovery. We need to ensure that the recovery is based on the vast opportunities that green transition offers.
Africa is home to a remarkable animal, plant, and marine biodiversity. The continent is rich in tropical forests, wetlands, deserts, savannah and montane grasslands, providing critical ecosystem services and serving as buffers to climate change. For example, mangrove swamps protect coastal societies in Eastern Africa from cyclones and tsunamis, while serving as homes for various species and a source of income for the local people.
However, the region is experiencing a dramatic loss of biodiversity. Agricultural and other human expansion on land and in the sea, overexploitation of wildlife and spread of invasive alien species are some of the drivers for biodiversity loss, and so is climate change and pollution. Scientists have warned that by 2100, climate change alone could cause the loss of over half of mammal and bird species and trigger a 10-30 per cent decline in lake productivity.