Nigeria urges cooperation among Niger Basin member-countries
NIGERIA has urged member-countries of the Niger Basin Authority(NBA) to forge a working relationship on all projects and programmes being executed at both national and regional levels.
Dr. Abba Ruma, the minister of Agriculture and Water Resources, made the call recently in Abuja.
He spoke at a meeting of the Regional Steering Committee on Silting Control Programme in Niger Basin project.
The nine-member countries are Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cote D'ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Niger, Chad and Nigeria.
Ruma said that such cooperation would have positive impact on the socio-economic costs of the projects' implementation "as they carry positive externalities and economies of scale."
He noted that the impact on environmental degradation in the Niger Basin on the well being of its population was a major concern to the governments.
The minister stressed the need to further strengthen cooperation within the NBA to ensure "a fair and equitable sharing of costs and benefits of our resources."
He commended ADB, the World Bank and Global Environment Facility (GEF) for financing the NBA projects.
The projects, he said, would contribute to poverty alleviation in the Niger Basin countries.
Mr. Linus Awute, the NBA coordinator in Nigeria, said that the organisation's projects would help to achieve "ecosystem balance and sustainable development in the basin."
He added that the Silting Control Project (SCP) being funded by the ADB at N48 million dollars, would last for seven years.
Awute said that the project would help to "interpret changes in the upstream hydrological situation and predict effects of upstream projects on the downstream."
Mr. Mohammed Tuga, NBA executive secretary, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that the organisation had been working in member-countries to address the problems of degradation and desert encroachment.
He said: "We have also taken steps to solve the problems by developing a master plan that will cover the whole basin."
