Environmental issues are at the forefront now. It is a race to save the environment from many negative things caused by human beings such as pollution caused by contaminants, desertification caused by felling of trees and the social impact of farmer/herder clash among others.
In any case, while it is good to be conscious of the impact of some activities on the environment, the directive issued by the Nasarawa State Government banning the use of charcoal in the state to protect the environment was hasty, akin to putting the cart before the horse.
The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, Aliyu Agwai announced this while addressing newsmen on Saturday in Lafia.
He said that the process of producing charcoal was harmful to the environment by destroying the climate and increasing global warming.
He also said that burning of charcoal, in particular, would produce harmful emissions.
“Cutting trees can result in the loss of habitat for animal species, which can harm the ecosystems.
“Almost all the land animals and plants live in forests and many cannot survive the deforestation that destroys their homes,” he said.
The big question, however, is are we ready for such a big ban? What have we done over the years to promote the use of alternative means to firewood or charcoal?
You keep hearing warnings on felling trees and how the use of firewood causes respiratory illness leading to death.
But nobody is telling you what you should use instead if you stop using firewood.
Even the Nasarawa State government did not tell the people what to use instead of charcoal. With such a ban that would affect many families, one would have expected the government to flood the state with camp gas cylinders, fill them and distribute them to the people. And it should be ready to give them money for refills as well. And maybe kerosene stoves and give them kerosene too.
When I first saw coal years ago I was happy, thinking that it was mined and that people would use less firewood, only to learn later that the coal was actually from firewood! So there was nothing to be happy about.
With the rise in the price of gas when people got used to it made many turn to good old firewood and charcoal. Some prefer coal because it doesn’t smoke.
A friend complained about the coal since she was not used to it. She said it took her a long time to prefer breakfast.
“I just have to buy gas today,” she said.
But not everybody could say that. There is hardship, prices of food items keep rising by the day, including prices of virtually everything.
Therefore the cheapest means of cooking fuel is charcoal; you can buy even a bundle of N100.00. And it is alright for the poor people, but certainly not for the authorities who worry about the environment.
The people that use the coal may also worry about the environment, but what would they do, they have to cook and eat.
In this regard, we would expect the Nasarawa State Government to have a time-line say, ten years or five years to phase out the use of charcoal in the state.
Then there should be an aggressive tree planting campaign and the actual planting of the trees, while it continues to search for alternative clean stoves and encourage their use when found.
Where it stops, it could only hope the next government would continue with this policy or all the gains it might have recorded would be wasted.
Our leaders should bring policies that are realistic, but not fire brigade approach and expect things to be right.
In this case people are human; they need time, enlightenment and above all an alternative means to charcoal.
In the race to save the environment, we should not be too quick to forget the needs of the human beings themselves and how they should be made to restore the environment by giving them alternatives where it applies.
