Kenya’s health authorities on Tuesday, June 12, 2018 confirmed the death of 75 people from cholera in the past five months this year.
Uhuru Kenyatta, the President of Kenya
Jackson Kioko, Director of Medical Services, Ministry of Health, said that 4,954 people had been infected with the disease that was first reported in the country in January.
“Nineteen counties have been affected, nine of these counties have managed to successfully contain the outbreak while 10 counties currently continue to report new cases of cholera on a daily basis,” Kioko said in a statement issued in Nairobi.
He said that in response to the outbreak, the ministry had provided laboratory support by distributing testing kits and testing of referred samples at The National Public Health Laboratories.
Also conducting risk communication through issuance of alerts and enhancing surveillance through active case search in health facilities and within communities.
Kioko said that the government would continue to provide technical and logistical support to the affected regions.
Six states in Nigeria are benefiting from the European Union Water Supply and Sanitation Sector Reform Project (WSSSRP) to improve access to water and sanitation in the country.
The states are Anambra, Cross River, Jigawa, Kano, Osun and Yobe.
Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Specialist, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Mr Jonathan Ekhator, made this known in Awka, the Anambra State capital, on Tuesday, June 12, 2018 at a media dialogue on WASH organised by UNICEF in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture.
He said the programme, which commenced in 2012, was targeted at providing water for no fewer than 1.5 million underserved persons in the rural areas.
According to him, lack of water and sanitation has been known to be a leading cause of preventable diseases such as cholera and diarrhoea, especially among under-five children.
Ekhator said since inception of the programme through the local government area-wide approach, no fewer than 2,527 WASH Committee members had been formed to train and maintain water facilities in the area.
He noted that this would help to promote sustainability and also inclusiveness to ensure that no one was left behind.
The WASH specialist said there was the need for all stakeholders to partner to ensure increased access to improved sanitation and hygiene promotion, an overall goal of moving up the sanitation ladder.
He said the group was carrying out advocacy to all tiers of government to see how they would budget for WASH, create a WASH Departments, programme tracking and closing needed gaps.
Also speaking, Mr Victor Ezekwo, Programme Manager, Anambra State Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency, said the state was working to see that access to water became a reality.
He noted that all the 21 local government areas had WASH units in place to help in propagating the scaling up access to water and sanitation.
Ezekwo expressed regret over the difficulty of people in getting pipe-borne water in the state, and attributed this to the state’s topography.
Earlier, Mr Sola Ogundipe, a consultant, urged participants to fashion out ways of writing stories that would have profound impact on the nation’s overall development.
According to him, journalists are story tellers, and they must understand that writing as a skill must be deplored to enhance positive change.
Ogundipe added that journalists must emphasise on writing human interest stories at all times, saying this was the surest way they would make serious impact on the society.
He commended UNICEF and the EU for being at the fore-front of ensuring that every Nigerian had access to potable water and sanitation.
As part of the Global Climate Action Summit, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), together with a broad coalition of partners, on Monday, June 11, 2018 issued the 30X30 Forests, Food and Land Challenge: calling on businesses, states, city and local governments, and global citizens to take action for better forest and habitat conservation, food production and consumption, and land use, working together across all sectors of the economy to deliver up to 30% of the climate solutions needed by 2030.
Head of WWF’s global climate and energy practice, Manuel Pulgar-Vidal
Hosted in San Francisco, California from September 12 to 14, the Summit will bring together thousands of people from around the world to drive ambition to the next level. According to the organisers, it will be a moment to recognise the extraordinary achievements of states, regions, cities, companies, investors, and citizens taking climate action and to catalyse bold new commitments and action.
Collectively, the global food system, unsustainable forest management, infrastructure development, and other activities related to land use are a major driver of global climate change, accounting for more greenhouse gas emissions than the total emissions from all cars, trucks, trains, planes and ships in the world. Forests, grasslands, and other habitats pull carbon out of the atmosphere, but when they are cleared, they release carbon and their capacity to reabsorb it is diminished. In the soil and in healthy ecosystems, carbon is a building block of life; in the atmosphere, it heats the planet.
“To curb climate change, we must address the second-greatest source of emissions: our use of land,” said Manuel Pulgar Vidal, leader of WWF’s global climate and energy practice. “By taking concrete action, businesses and local leaders also can encourage national governments to more aggressively reduce carbon emissions using every resource available, including trees, grasses and soil.”
California State Governor, Edmund G. Brown Jr., a Summit co-chair, recently underlined the actions California is taking to deal with forest losses. Forests serve as the state’s largest land-based carbon sink, drawing carbon from the atmosphere, but even a single wildfire can quickly undermine those benefits.
“Devastating forest fires are a profound challenge to California,” Governor Brown said recently when issuing a sweeping Executive Order to increase the ability of forests to capture carbon. “I intend to mobilise the resources of the state to protect our forests and ensure they absorb carbon to the maximum degree.”
“Climate change is already disrupting and destabilising our global food and agricultural systems,” said Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever. “By eliminating habitat loss and degradation from our supply chains, we can prevent the emission of billions of tons of greenhouse gases. Businesses like ours have a responsibility and an opportunity to help the nations of the world meet and exceed the goals of the Paris Agreement.”
Businesses, state and local agencies, multilateral organisations, scientists, and other stakeholders can meet this challenge by taking concrete action to:
Halve food loss and waste and consume conscientiously.
Sequester one gigaton of carbon per year in forests and other natural and working lands.
Enable better production of food and fibre by unlocking finance, providing tools to increase transparency, fostering public-private collaboration and protecting local rights.
Because Indigenous Peoples and local communities are among the most effective guardians of natural habitats and most directly harmed by the loss and degradation of forests and waterways, engaging and protecting these constituencies and their tenure rights will be critical to meeting the 30X30 Challenge.
“Given the large but unrecognised contributions indigenous peoples are making by protecting huge areas of the world’s forests, we are central to the climate solution,” said Cándido Mezua, an Embera leader from Panama and secretary for international relations for the Mesoamerican Alliance of Peoples and Forests (AMPB). “Governments and the private sector should embrace our approach to sustainable development, partner with us in the planning, and allow us to share in the prosperity that results.”
The Technical Adviser, All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Dr. Tunde Arosanyin, has called for proper implementation of the rural development policies in Nigeria to set agenda for the future.
A rural settlement in Nigeria
Arosonyin, an agriculturist, said in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday, June 11, 2018 in Abuja that except rural development is given the attention it deserves, the goals of achieving accelerated national development at the grassroots level would remain a mirage.
Developing rural areas, according to him, has become imperative to reposition the agricultural sector to meet the emerging challenges of the 21st century.
The agriculturist said that if the government can pool resources to engender the required synergy, then there would be significant difference.
“The infrastructures are in a bad state and that’s why most of the produce always end up at the farm gate, making it difficult for farmers to get dividend for their produce,’’ he said.
Arosonyin, who is also the National Coordinator of Zero Hunger Commodities, said rural development has become imperative because more than 79 percent of farmers feeding the nation live in the rural areas and they have no access to basic infrastructure.
He said it is unfortunate that rural development aimed at actualising the dream of improving the people’s socio-economic welfare has remained at the policy level.
Arosonyin lamented that most of rural areas in the country, have been unable to pass the basic indices of modern development in terms of rural development, especially regarding industrial and health facilities, standard and qualitative system of education and other social services.
“Provision of basic infrastructure such as potable water, electricity supply and access roads will surely reduce urban migration and create rapid development in rural areas.
“The need to boost agriculture in rural areas is very essential considering the ever rising population of the country,’’ he said.
He, however, said that even though the Federal Government through the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has come up with a model of the input index for farmers, a lot still need to be done to improve the lives of farmers and productivity.
Arosonyin advised government to review the principles of the National Policy on Integrated Rural Development for proper implementation to lay a solid foundation for national development.
He said a World Bank report indicated that Nigeria’s rural sector with abundance of human and natural resources accommodates 49.7 percent of the nation’s population.
Arosonyin, however, said that yet, the rural communities are lacking in infrastructural facilities such as roads, potable water supply and sanitation, energy, communication, health, education facilities among others.
“It is estimated that 85 percent of the extremely poor in Nigeria currently live in rural areas.
“Nevertheless, the rural sector is predominantly agriculture-based which include livestock, forestry and fisheries and employed 75 percent of the labour force and contributes about 40 per cent of the GDP,’’ he said.
Arosonyin also called on the government to improve the cooperative ties of the farmers to enable them to be independent.
The agriculturist said: “A lot of studies have shown that the prospect of farmers in agricultural cooperatives group are enormous and opens purchasing power for them.
“Agricultural cooperatives are considered as one of the important economic and social organisation in rural communities.’’
Arosoyin emphasised that agricultural cooperatives globally, play major role in the rural development.
He noted that the agricultural sector in Nigeria is faced with lots of challenges and that farmers no longer got remunerative prices for their efforts.
Non-degradable plastic products and disposable food containers, as well as fossil-fueled vehicles will be prohibited on Weizhou Island off south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, local media reported on Tuesday, June 12, 2018.
Weizhou Island
According to an ecological and environmental protection regulation passed by the regional legislature, the sale and use of plastic bags and plastic sheets used for agricultural purposes will be banned.
“Except for vehicles already registered by individuals and departments, as well as vehicles that serve the public, like firetrucks, no other new fossil-fueled vehicles will be allowed on the island,’’ it noted.
The ban, which aims to promote new energy vehicles and protect the island’s ecosystem, will take effect on July 1.
Weizhou Island in the Beibu Gulf is the largest and youngest volcanic island in China.
A national geological park was established on the island in 2004.
Some Indian farmers are openly sowing an unapproved variety of Genetically Modified (GM) cotton seeds developed by Monsanto, risking arrest.
The GM Bt Cotton is said to have failed in Burkina Faso, with farmers making claims from Monsanto
They sow as the government sits on the side-lines for fear of antagonising a big voting bloc ahead of an election in 2018.
India approved the first GM cotton seed trait in 2002 and an upgraded variety in 2006, helping transform the country into the world’s top producer and second-largest exporter of the fibre.
But newer traits are not available after Monsanto in 2016 withdrew an application seeking approval for the latest variety due to a royalty dispute with the government.
The herbicide-tolerant variety, lab-altered to help farmers save costs on weed management, has, however, seeped into the country’s farms since then. Authorities say they are still investigating how that happened.
“I will only use these seeds or nothing at all,” said Rambhau Shinde, a farmer who has been cultivating cotton for nearly four decades in the western state of Maharashtra.
The federal environment ministry said last year that planting the seeds violated the Environment Protection Act, and farmers who did so were risking potential jail terms.
But many farmers are desperate to boost their incomes after poor yields over the past few years and are willing to ignore the warnings.
A government official in New Delhi, who deals with matters related to GM crops, said it was difficult to keep farmers away from something that they saw benefit in.
“If you don’t allow them to plant legally, illegal planting will happen,’’ the official said, requesting anonymity, adding that Monsanto had yet to reapply for an approval to sell its latest variety of GM cotton in India.
A Monsanto Indian spokesman said the company was confident that the government would prosecute those involved in the illegal trade of the unapproved seeds.
Except for GM cotton, India has not approved any other transgenic crop on concerns over their safety, and large foreign companies have been increasingly unhappy at what they say is the infringement of their intellectual property by widespread planting of unapproved seeds.
Farmers say they prefer Monsanto’s herbicide-tolerant Roundup Ready Flex (RRF) strain of cotton seeds as they can cut input costs by as much as 10,000 rupees ($150) an acre compared with other varieties.
Cotton growers are also getting support from farmers’ unions, who are already at loggerheads with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government amid a fall in prices of many agricultural commodities.
Without new varieties of seeds, they fear being outplayed by other major cotton producers and exporters such as the United States, Brazil and Australia, said Anil Ghanwat, the president of a farmers’ organisation in Maharashtra.
“The government is asking us to carry a sword to fight the enemy with AK-56 rifles,” said Ghanwat, who has urged farmers to sow the unapproved GM seed. “We will protect them if government authorities try to destroy the crop or harass them with legal cases.’’
In 2017, just before cotton harvesting, authorities found plantations of unapproved seeds in key producing states such as Maharashtra and Gujarat in the west and Andhra Pradesh and Telangana in the south.
In February, authorities in Telangana told two local companies that cotton seeds they sold to farmers may have contained traces of Monsanto’s RRF strain, though the companies denied that.
This year various states have formed inspection teams to curb the sale of such seeds, though farmers have built a parallel network to distribute them without getting caught, said M.S. Gholap, director at Maharashtra’s agriculture department.
The seeds were being produced secretly, mainly in Gujarat and Telangana, and then smuggled to other states, Gholap said.
Maharashtra has seized unapproved seeds worth 178,000 dollars in the past two months, enough to cultivate 10,000 hectares, said Gholap.
Farmers are paying as much as a 30 per cent premium for the unapproved seeds in Maharashtra and Gujarat compared with seeds of older strains.
The proliferation of unapproved seeds could force the government to grant approval to the new seed technology, as happened in 2002 when New Delhi legalised planting of the Bt Cotton GM strain, said C D Mayee, head of South Asia Biotechnology Centre, a New Delhi-based non-profit organisation.
The strong demand for the illegal seeds has alarmed some federal government officials.
“Once farmers realise laws are toothless, then they could cultivate GM soybean, corn and other crops, it would have serious impact on our biodiversity India farmers sow unapproved Monsanto cotton seeds, risking arrest,” said one anonymous official.
Abuja, Lagos and Calabar have been selected as the pilot cities for the urban transport mobility project, an initiative of the World Bank.
Calabar, in Cross River State, eastern Nigeria, is one of the three cities selected to pilot the urban transport mobility project in Nigeria
Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, who made the disclosure on Monday, June 11, 2018 in Abuja, said that the ministry would partner with the World Bank and other relevant stakeholders on how to effectively integrate urban transport mobility in the three pioneer cities in Nigeria.
Amaechi spoke at the Urban Transport and Mobility Stakeholders Forum, sponsored by World Bank under the Africa Transport Policy Programme (SSATP).
Amaechi, who was represented by Dr Anthonia Ekpa, Director, Road Transport and Mass Transit Administration, said that the programme was funded by World Bank under one of its transport policy programme.
He said that Nigeria is a member of SSATP, which comprises 41 countries that will carry out an integrated study on urban transport and mobility.
“This forum of stakeholders on Urban Transport and Mobility is focusing on sustainable mobility and accessibility policy in cities of Nigeria.
According to him, the purpose of the programme is to bring together major stakeholders in Nigeria to discuss the imperatives of having our cities modernised and in compliance with the best practices.
“We want to see how transportation in the cities can be effective and how it can be implemented to improve the transport system.
“The forum is organised to hear from stakeholders their perceptive.
“On the issue of mobility and we are not just talking about cars only, but how can we bring cars and people to integrate effectively, which is a global meeting.”
Mr Zemedkun Tessema, Senior Transport Specialist, SSATP Africa Transport Policy Programme, said that it was assisting countries policy in transport mobility.
He said that the programme was not to replace what government was doing but to complement their efforts through institutional building and sustainable financing.
Tessema, however, said that it was focusing on policies to create an advance transport mobility system in African looking at both primary and secondary cities.
At a Vatican conference at the week-end, Pope Francis has urged oil executives and energy leaders to rapidly transition to clean fuels in order to avert climate disaster.
Pope Francis
The head of the Catholic Church said rising greenhouse gas levels were “disturbing and a cause for real concern”.
Aside from the alarming amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases, Pope Francis said, “Even more worrying is the continued search for new fossil fuel reserves, whereas the Paris Agreement clearly urged keeping most fossil fuels underground.”
Around 80% of fossil fuel reserves would need to be kept in the ground for the international community to reach its goal of staying below a maximum two degrees Celsius global average temperature rise, the central objective of the historic Paris Climate Change Agreement.
In a similar message to the 2015 Laudato Si’ (Praised Be) letter to Catholics on climate change, Pope Francis called on energy leaders in to show care for “our common home”.
The Laudato Si’ encyclical, published just months ahead of the Paris UN Climate Change Conference in France at which the Paris Agreement was inked, is credited with providing key momentum for the successful clinching of the agreement, as it convinced millions of Catholics world-wide of the urgency to act.
UN Climate Chief, Patricia Espinosa, praised the efforts of Pope Francis in a tweet on Sunday, June 10, 2018. “Thank you @Pontifex Francis for providing strong spiritual guidance on the need to take decisive #ClimateAction by quickly and decisively transitioning to #CleanEnergy,” she wrote.
Vatican Seeks Dialogue with the Oil Industry and investors
The conference, which was held on Saturday, June 9 at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, brought oil executives together with investors and Vatican experts who back the scientific evidence that climate change is caused by human activity.
Advocating for a faster transition to clean energy, Pope Francis said, “We need to talk together – industry, investors, researchers and consumers – about transition and the search for alternatives. Civilisation requires energy, but energy use must not destroy civilisation!”
The Catholic leader said that the effects of climate change are not evenly distributed. In fact, it is the poor who suffer most from the consequences of climate change such as agricultural sector disruptions, water insecurity and exposure to extreme weather events.
Many of the world’s poor are being forced to migrate from their homes to less welcoming places because of climate change. A world bank report projects that without concrete climate and development action, over 143 million people could be forced to move within their own countries to escape the impacts of climate change.
Further, the report states that internal climate migration will likely rise through 2050 and then accelerate unless there are significant cuts in greenhouse gas emissions and robust development action.
Pope Francis said that the transition to accessible and clean energy is a “duty that we owe towards millions of our brothers and sisters around the world, poorer countries and generations yet to come.”
“Hence the need to devise a long-term global strategy able to provide energy security and, by laying down precise commitments to meet the problem of climate change, to encourage economic stability, public health, the protection of the environment and integral human development,” he added.
The pope acknowledged that the demand for energy cannot be satisfied at the cost of the environment.
“Our desire to ensure energy for all must not lead to the undesired effect of a spiral of extreme climate changes due to a catastrophic rise in global temperatures, harsher environments and increased levels of poverty,” he said.
The oil and gas industry has come under growing pressure from investors and activists to play a bigger role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions to meet goals set out in the Paris Agreement.
Neil Thorns, director of advocacy at Catholic aid agency CAFOD, welcomed the Pope “preaching to the not-yet-converted”.
“Francis reminds us in his encyclical that ‘Business is a noble vocation’, but also asks why anyone would want to be remembered for failing to act when the world’s poorest people are being pushed deeper into poverty by climate change. It’s a question fossil fuel executives would do well to ask themselves,” he said.
“If energy companies are serious about caring for our common home, they need to take the Pope’s advice and hurry up with shifting their priorities – and therefore their money – from fossil fuels to renewables.”
Among the 50 participants were Darren Woods, CEO of ExxonMobil; Claudio Descalzi, head of Italy’s ENI; Bob Dudley of BP; Eldar Saetre, CEO of Norwegian oil firm Equinor (formerly called Statoil); Vicki Hollub of Occidental Petroleum; and investors including Larry Fink of BlackRock.
The Adamawa State Ministry of Health has confirmed 19 new cases of cholera in Mubi North and Mubi South Local Government areas.
Governor Bindo Umaru Jibrilla of Adamawa State
A statement on Monday, June 11, 2018 by the Information Officer of the ministry, Mr Mohammed Abubakar, said that 16 of the new cases were recorded in Mubi South while three were reported in Mubi South.
Abubakar said that, so far, a total of 1,227 cases were recorded within the past one month with 20 deaths while 19 patients were still on admission at the treatment centre in Mubi General Hospital as at Sunday, June 10.
He said Hong local government has five cases without death, Maiha local government has three cases without death, Mubi North has 526 cases with 11 deaths, while Mubi South has 693 cases with nine deaths.
The Pacific Northwest is the home to the states of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. Washington State has its largest city, Seattle, in the very heart of the King County. The city of Seattle is bordered by a body of salt water (Puget Sound) to the west and a freshwater lake (Lake Washington) to the east. It’s interesting to know that both Puget Sound and Lake Washington were carved by glaciers.
EarthCorps International Exchange Fellows
EarthCorps is a non-profit organisation, located in Magnuson Park, Seattle, Washington. It was established by a nature-loving Peace Corps volunteer, named Dwight Wilson. Wilson saw the need to urgently take action in restoring Seattle’s large urban forests from destruction by invasive weeds and, in 1993, he and some other friends took action in an experimental programme named Cascadia Quest. The corps programme was born when this effort grew into a year-round intensive service for futuristic young leaders.
More so, 25 years later, I am happy to say that EarthCorps is pushing boundaries by innovating ecological practice, evolving how people learn leadership, and engaging diverse communities in hands-on environmental restoration activities. Indeed, this foot is achieved with the effort of hardworking volunteers (International and AmeriCorps), staffs and sponsors!
It’s on record that EarthCorps opens an application window every year, around August, for environmentalists and environmental workers in all parts of the world who have proved to have some field working experience to be a part of a global community of people helping to restore the health of our environment, in Seattle, Washington.
Yours sincerely, Surajdeen Alabede, from Nigeria, is one of the international volunteer corps members selected to participate in this year’s exercise. Both the International and United States’ (AmeriCorps) volunteers will be on the field to exchange perspectives, learn through service and to remove invasive weed and plant native trees.
The International Corps Members are expected to return home after a six-month (June to December) field-based service-learning programme to implement projects and share what they have learned with their organisations and communities.
It has been an inspiring experience meeting with other participants from countries like Kenya, Cameroon, Georgia, Philippines, Brazil, Indian and the United States. We all left our various countries to the United States with a common goal of changing the world by restoring the health of our damaged environment.
The first week of the programme has been productive, learning about the organisation’s culture, leadership philosophy, ecological restoration, cross-cultural communication, cultural adaptation, safety techniques, tool use and Pacific Northwest history and ecology.
Lindsey, an EarthCorps worker, did justice to the ecological restoration topic. And it’s amazing to know that the English Ivy and Himalayan Blackberry have been the most aggressive invasive species of plant found in this region and they have done lots of damages to our environment. It takes a huge effort removing them and installing native plants like the conifers and maples.
Native plants installed help to enhance the aesthetic value of the city, attract native birds and butterfly species, that is, a good function is created by putting the right ecological structure in place.
The safety class covers the need to be safety conscious all the time. Paula, the safety instructor, made it known that Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) should not be toyed with and proper ergonomics must be maintained at all times when going to the field for restoration exercise.
I would love to close this week’s episode of my writing with one of the beautiful lines of the organisation’s leadership philosophy that reads, “Everyone can grow to be an effective leader.” Truly, effective leaders are not born, but rather made, through the way they handle things and deal with people around them.
Till next week when I come your way again, always keep eyes on this space!
By Alabede Surajdeen (Environmental International Exchange Fellow at EarthCorps, Seattle, Washington, USA; alabedekayode@gmail.com, @BabsSuraj)
