Water sustainability is a significant issue in Nigeria like
many other developing nations. The water sustainability in Nigeria is
associated with many factors including desertification; forests and the
depletion of critical wetlands. Also, it includes the pollution of water
sources from point sources such as industrial effluent and urban domestic
wastes; unregulated utilization of groundwater for domestic purposes. The
unsustainability has given rise to the issue of unavailability of portable
water for citizens in many regions especially in the rural areas. Water
scarcity in this context translates to questions like an outbreak of diseases
as well as other health related issues, reduction in productivity and
inefficiency in agricultural practices and many others.
Water sustainability issues in developing countries such as
Nigeria can be better addressed by considering the participation of the
stakeholders. This has to do with customers, employees, stockholders, the
government, companies and so forth with interest, involvement, and investment
in the issue. In fact, the management of shared natural resources requires keen
participation of multi-stakeholders and also adequate self-regulation. In other
words, the stakeholders must evaluate a reason to self-governance.
The sustainability in water would require such pragmatic
strategies that are building efficient mechanism for water provision. Firstly,
we need adaptive and evolving delivery mechanisms to ensure that water flows
continuously. Contrarily to what most people think, this could be a very
complicated process. Community participation on its own can only go thus far
but will not achieve sustainability in toto. The stakeholders need to
participate in pursuing water sustainability and also to make it apparent that
participation in this context pays more than non-participation.
There are many challenges and impediments to the
partnerships of stakeholders in water sustainability in Nigeria. There is a
need of planning, development and management of water resources with the
consultancy of the stakeholders because it is resulting in unreliable projects
that do not meet the demands and needs of the inhabitants. The worst aspect is
associated with the assets and facilities usually built not maintained or in a
few cases, insufficiently supported and hence they go bad with the passage of
time. In addition, there is usually an issue of conflicting and different
interests and views of multiple stakeholders. This remarkably influences the
local management of land and water resources. As a result of this,
sustainability practice can only be ensured in the context of the requisite
policies. Institutions are developed, and such system or policies will help in
ensuring that the stakeholders come to a level ground in negotiation, views,
and interests.
The undesirable impacts of water scarcity and lack of
sustainability is far reaching and includes loss of revenue, declining
health-care and economic problems. In addition, water pollution in Nigeria
causes environmental degradation, and it further posited that this problem can
be effectively tackled via coordinated policy as well as institutional and
legal framework. The major factors responsible for water pollution in Nigeria
is the release of pollutants and effluents from industries. Moreover, it
includes the sewers, contamination of groundwater by hydrocarbon,
non-protection of watersheds, reduced mining activities and saline intrusion of
groundwater. Consequently, this spread a lot of infectious diseases that result
to the death of millions of children each year. Another major cause of water
pollution in Nigeria is oil spillage and gas flaring. These are serious
concerns to the environment. The gas flaring is the major cause of acid rains
and pollution in rivers and streams. This causes a lot of environmental
problems and devastates the environment.
In short, billions of people in the world face water
scarcity, pollution and sanitation problems irrespective of the fact that water
is a gift of nature to mankind. Pollution is the major cause of water scarcity
and also many people living in rural areas of Nigeria, who do not have access
to drinking water. A good example of this is Ugwueke, a village in Bende Local
Government Area, Abia State in South-Eastern Nigeria.
 |
| Scarcity of Water in Nigeria |
No comments:
Post a Comment