From nitrogen pollution to gene drives: UN highlights five key emerging issues

Urgent action from nations around the world is required to tackle emerging environmental challenges that will have profound effects on our society, economy and ecosystems, the United Nations Environment Programme has warned.

Environmental threats put human health in peril, UN warns

Unsustainable human activities have degraded the Earth’s ecosystems, endangering the ecological foundations of society. Environmental damage to our planet is so dire that human health will be increasingly threatened unless urgent action is taken.

FG embarks on ranching, sign MOU with a market outlet, farm

·         Says will support every other stakeholders

 

The Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to expedite action with a private market outlet and an incorporated farm towards better animal productivity as President Mohammed Buhari has approved the RUGA model of facilities provision for herdsmen to mitigate incessant clashes with farmers through ranching.

Images speak @ NESG public-private dialogue with Agriculture sector stakeholders held in Abuja

Images speak @ NESG public-private dialogue with Agriculture sector stakeholders held in Abuja, on "strengthen enabling policy environment for fertiliser system, seed system and warehouse receipt system in Nigeria’’ see more images below..

UN report calls for better access to water for small-scale farmers

Access to water and sanitation is a human right. However, billions of people are still living without safe water and sanitation facilities, with wide disparities between the rich and the poor. This is the message of the UN World Water Development Report, launched on 19 March three days ahead of World Water Day. Some 2.1 billion people do not have access to safe drinking water and 4.5 billion people lack safely managed sanitation facilities.

Aquaculture: Expert advocates for more fishes documentation

The Deputy Provost, Fresh Water Fisheries Technology, Bagu, Bornu state, Dr. Olarenwaju Nurudeen 

The Deputy Provost, Fresh Water Fisheries Technology, Bagu, Bornu state, Dr. Olarenwaju Nurudeen has advocated for biological documentation of more economic fishes from the wild to upscale commercial aquaculture production to meet local consumption and checkmate huge import bill.  

Experts canvas for speedy passage of bill...

* Farmers' group fault implementation process

 

Experts in the agricultural sector have called on the federal government on the need to pass in to law, bills such as seed, fertilizer and warehouse receipt system in Nigeria to help boast and reposition the agricultural industry, so as to return to its pride of place.

PATIENCE IS PAINFUL, BUT STILL BEST BET FOR #CORNPLANT19

With each passing day, the wait to plant corn is a little more painful. As of May 6, corn planting is only 23% complete in the nation’s 18 largest corn-producing states, according to USDA’s National Ag Statistics Service. That’s half the progress of corn planting in any other year, NASS reports.

Illegal seeds: Scientists advise farmers on hybrids

·         NASC may soon begin e- certification

Seeds

Farmers have been admonished by agricultural scientists to ensure the use of only certified hybrid seeds as there are many fake of such in circulation that were imported without National Agricultural Seed Council (NASC)‘s approval just as the body reiterated its readiness to ensure certification through electronic means using digital tracking to reduce adulteration.

The advice to the end users by scientists was given chiefly by the Executive Director, Institute for Agricultural Research (IAR), Prof. Ibrahim U. Abubakar during the annual cropping scheme for year 2019, held at Samaru, Zaria.

Rainforests the size of England lost in 2018 due to deforestation

The world lost 12 million hectares of tropical forest in 2018, an area the size of England, new data from the University of Maryland reveals. According to the figures, released on April 25 by Global Forest Watch, this is the fourth-highest annual loss since records began in 2001.