Environmental Conservation is About Human Protection, Says Onoja

Fadekemi Ajakaiye

The Director General of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation (NCF), Dr. Joseph Onoja has said that environmental conservation is actually about protecting humanity.

Onoja stated this at a ceremonial tree planting exercise organised by the Foundation and its partner, ATC Nigeria Wireless Limited, recently. This is part of activities for the planting of a million trees by NCF and partners in 2024 to help promote environmental sustainability while tackling the climate change crisis through tree planting & nurturing.

“Sometimes someone may ask, why tree planting? Why do we want to plant trees? Why protect the Earth? It’s the way to tell people that when we talk about environmental protection or conservation, we are not actually talking about environmental protection or environmental conservation. We’re actually talking about human protection, because the environment will always take care of itself, but if you allow the environment to take care of itself, it will do so by getting rid of us. And that is why we need to be involved, and that is why we need to come together to see how we can push forward. And that is why we are excited, at the Nigerian Conservation Foundation, to have a responsible organisation like ATC Nigeria Wireless Limited to join us in this struggle. We know that the rate of deforestation has really, really gone bad in Nigeria. In fact, it is estimated that Nigeria loses about the size of Lagos in terms of forest land every year. And which is really, really a terrible thing to do. I mean, a terrible situation that we find ourselves in as a country. And that is why in 2016 and 2017 the NCF came up with this great recovery Nigeria programme, a very ambitious project where we hope that we can build back Nigeria’s forest cover from the dwindling less than 10% that we have to at least 25% as recommended by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.”

Onoja suggested that people should commemorate events like birthdays by planting trees “instead of throwing parties. When celeberating our birthdays or our ceremonies or anniversaries, let us plant trees. It’s very important. We’ll be doing nature, doing ourselves, the children that are yet unborn, a privilege, and an opportunity.”
He explained that the Lekki Conservation Center is one of the project sites of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation. “We like to make this distinction, because the headquarters of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation also resides here, and sometimes when you say Nigerian Conservation Foundation, people don’t know where it is but when you say LCC, the Lekki Conservation Center. Yes, everybody kind of knows about it.” 

The Chief Executive Officer of ATC Nigeria Wireless Limited, Mr Soji Moris Diya said, “in 2018 the global company made a mandate, so to speak, to plant a million trees over the next few years. And this is part of the journey that we’ve been on in Nigeria. “We’ve also taken the bold step to do these exercises every year across multiple locations. And I think I have the list of places that we’ve done it so far. We started just in 2022, so we didn’t start in 2018, with the rest of the organisation. But since then, I think our guys have been committed not only to doing it, but also committed to doing it well. “So we’ve done 20,000 trees that have been planted across 14 states and the Federal Capital Territory.

“Again, this year, we’re excited to plant at least 6,000 trees across six states, Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Taraba, Jigawa, Yobe and the FCT. And I think maybe the last key message is that, why? Why are we doing this? You know, in addition to the fact that we have all these things that we’re doing to reduce our precise consumption, it’s also about the culture. And I think that’s what you’re speaking to, Dr Joseph, that it’s about building this culture where everybody’s recognising what it is. You know, if you look at what has happened for a lot of people that live around this axis; they’ve seen what flooding has done. They’ve seen what urbanisation, quote, unquote, has done without the commensurate replenishing of the environment. So I think it’s an important message for all of us to carry on.”