The Federal Government of Nigeria has inaugurated new programmes to curb air pollution in the country.
Minister of Environment, Mr Muhammed Abdullahi, who spoke at the unveiling of the programme that was organised by the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA) in Abuja, said that the transport sector has been identified as the major source of air pollution in the country as over 12 million vehicles ply the roads.
Abdullahi urged relevant stakeholders to support the Federal Government’s effort for effective implementation of the programmes to ensure a cleaner and healthier environment.
The minister also expressed concern over the indiscriminate use of power generators for both domestic and industrial purposes, noting that the trend contributed to the poor air quality in the environment.
He explained that the situation affected negatively not only the environment but human health by increasing the number of harmful pollutants.
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Abdullahi also called for more support from the international organisation towards combating air pollution, noting that it was one of the greatest health and environmental challenges.
He said the programmes had been designed to address the emissions from mobile and stationary sources, adding that it also aimed at cutting down emissions of pollutants from generators’ stationary sources as well as vehicles’ mobile sources.
The programmes, he said, would be implemented under the Public Private Partnership (PPP), and involve periodic testing of the generators and vehicles for toxic and greenhouse gas emissions.
“In this strategy, the responsibility of NESREA will be to set national emission standards and to develop a reliable national database management system for all emissions data generated from the programmes,” he said.
The minister said that part of the NESREA’s mandate was to support the implementation of the Paris Agreement as spelt out in the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
Story was adapted from EnvironNewsNigeria.
