Nigeria's Forests May Be Gone By 2010 - 4.9% Total Land Area Now Forested - AFP

[hatrack]

The head of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation, Phillip Asiodu, has warned that Nigeria may be left with no forests by 2010 due to ongoing deforestation, the News Agency of Nigeria reported on Thursday. "With so much illegal logging going on across the country, coupled with the very little replanting programmes, there may be no forest left by 2010," Asiodu said at a public lecture.

Asiodu, a fomer chief economic adviser to the president, said contrary to the recommendation of the UN Food And Agriculture Organisation that 25 percent of the country's land area should be under forest, Nigeria has only 4.9 percent.

"An FAO country report of 2003 gives total area under forests in Nigeria, natural and planted, at 4,456,000 hectares (about 11 million acres) out of a land area of 92,400,000 hectares, which is about 4.9 per cent," he said, adding that for the same year planted forests accounted for only 325,000 hectares of the total.

More than 70 per cent of the nation's population depend on fuel wood, which is not used efficiently without fuel stoves. Contrary to other countries in the region, Nigeria shows no sign of moving away from its dependence on wood for fuel, he said. He said an estimated 484 plant species in 112 families including many medicinal and fruit trees, are also threatened with extinction because of habitat destruction and deforestation.

EDIT

http://www.terradaily.com/2006/070118213457.prk24xto.html

[silverojo]

1. Aw, but who gives a shit?

As long as the logging companies make money RIGHT NOW! :mad:

[LSK]

2. SHIT