In an attempt to fight desertification and restore degraded land across the implementing Nineteen Northern States and FCT of Agro-Climatic Resilience in Semi-Arid Landscape (ACReSAL), a World Bank-funded project has entered a partnership with the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
The disclosure was made by the Project Coordinator of ACReSAL in Bauchi state, Dr Ibrahim Kabir during a step-down engagement with relevant stakeholders in Bauchi state.
“We signed an MoU targeting to restore 350,000 hectares of degraded land across the 19 Northern states and the FCT. This is out of the targeted 1 million hectares that was resounding in the project.
“After the engagement for the FAO and the ACReSAL, they invited us for a capacity building where we had a workshop on the new techniques of large-scale land restoration. We were directed to come back to our various states and step down. We were given a mandate to identify the key stakeholders that can support us in restoring these degraded lands.
“We were able to identify the areas in the first stage. We co-opted the Forestry Officers who are in the field across the 20 local government areas of the State, the Agricultural Extension Workers and the staff of the Ministry of Water Resources who are also in the communities particularly the riverine areas of the state.
“So, we also brought the Local Government Staff of Agriculture and Forestry, now we are doing the step-down,” he stressed.
The ACReSAL PC stressed, “What we are trying to impart in them from our previous workshop is to put them through because they are the implementors. There is no land to reclaim in Abuja, there is no land to restore here in Bauchi at the headquarters, we have to go to the communities. So that is why we invited them, they are more than 200 and we are stepping down and giving them the necessary skills.”
Ibrahim Kabir pointed out that ACReSAL has its principles and guide on how to do the restoration process and that is why it was captured in the ‘Catchment Management Plan’ where the communities across the state are delineated in the river basins and also the wetlands.
“This is the best strategy for land restoration, it is to be able to identify the locations based on the catchment management plan.
“We are now in the process of identifying all the degraded lands that are in Bauchi across the 20 local government areas. We want to invest heavily in afforestation, we are going beyond planting of trees but we want to create like a mini ecosystem where we have the trees, the shrubs, the grasses and all the wildlife that are supposed to be there,” The PC added.
“It is an integrated approach and that’s why we have and that’s why we have staff of the Ministry of Water Resources. We will invest heavily in creating some microclimate across the 20 local government areas, that’s the drive.
“It is not the number of trees that matter, we are talking about hectares. When you plant the trees, how many hectares are you targeting to have. For this particular project, not ACReSAL entirely, for the partnership between the FAO and the ACReSAL at the national level, Bauchi pledged that we are going to restore 20,000 hectares of land in 2024 alone particularly in the northern part of the state where we have harsh weather, where we have lots of desertification issues.”
“So, we are pledging and we are trying to see with this kind of stakeholding we can do to deliver 20,000 hectares. One good thing about it is that the techniques that we are going to deploy are mainly mechanical not manual. We have a pan now under ACReSAL that we are going to procure a delpino flo which has a capacity beyond tractor machinery that we are going to use in order to prepare land for restoration.
“You can use Delpino flo to plant millions of trees within a year that can cover so many hectares. This is part of what we are going to do, it is mechanized in nature and that is why we are hopeful that with this kind of mechanization approach, we can be able to deliver this 20,00 hectares,” he added.
