Nigeria FG moves to clear hazardous pesticides

Nigeria Federal Government has entered into an agreement with Croplife Nigeria for the purpose of carrying out an inventory of the stockpile of unused and obsolete pesticides in the country and subsequently taking measures to neutralise the harmful effects of the substances.

Minister of Environment, Mr. John Odey, who signed a Memorandum ofUnderstanding with the group on behalf of government at the weekend, said Croplife is to assist the Nigeria-Africa Stockpiles Programme (Nigeria-ASP) in order to reduce the menace of pesticides in the country. He observed that with the signing of the agreement, Nigeria-Africa Stockpiles Programme will be further strengthened to reduce harmful effects which accumulated pesticides would have caused in the country.

The minister urged the technical committee of Nigeria-ASP to increase its awareness and sensitisation activities so as to make more Nigerians, particularly farmers to be aware of expired pesticides.

He commended the agency, for this gesture and called on all other well meaning agencies and stakeholders to emulate Croplife.

Earlier, the President, Croplife Nigeria, Mr. Jerry Wright said his organisation will render technical advice to Nigeria-ASP Programme to enhance the successful completion of its assignment.

The Nigeria-ASP Programme (Nigeria-ASP) is one of the seven continental projects being implemented under the Africa Stockpiles Phase 1 (ASP-P1). It has been developed as a regional initiative designed for the removal of obstacles to the clean-up and safe destruction of obsolete pesticide stockpiles from Africa.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), children are exposed to pesticides compared with adults due to their greater intake of food, water, and air per unit of body weight, their greater activity levels, narrower dietary choices, crawling, and hand-to-mouth behavior.