HOMEF Director, Dr. Nnimmo Bassey.
By Anietie Akpan
An Environmental expert and human rights advocate has declared that Nigeria needs big political decisions and not political fertilizers to check food insecurity in the country.
The environmentalist, Dr. Nnimmo Bassey who is the Director of Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), also called for an end to colonial-era forest management systems in Nigeria, urging the government to adopt community-led conservation models that prioritise local knowledge and ecological justice.
Chatting with some newsmen in Calabar recently on issues of food securit, how to boost agriculture and others in Nigeria, Bassey said, “I believe that politicians should be concerned about supporting our small scale farmers to produce food that is healthy for our people. The idea of plantation agriculture led to slavery. So plantation idea is what we should run away from”.
He said “today mono culture for food is coming in terms of genetically engineered crops because you can not plant them with other crops . So you have one big territory but one mono culture or crop. You don’t mix them because they depend on a lot of toxic external inputs like chemicals like herbicides, pesticides and others.
“Some of them are even pesticides like the beans that was introduced into Nigeria, a genetically engineered beans is pesticidal because it kills the pest that normally attack beans. So if you eat that beans you are eating a pesticide”.
To stern this therefore, Bassey, former chairman of Friends of the Earth International, postulated that food security in Nigeria needs multiple approaches to resolve.
“We need to fight insecurity”, he said noting that, “our farmers must be able to go to their farms safely, cultivate, harvest and move their crops.
“Secondly there must be rural infrastructure. The farmer grows crops, he must be able to take his produce to the market, otherwise he gets a very poor return. If what he gets is nothing to write home about, he can not take care of his family, then he will not be able to expand the farm to grow more crops . So we need infrastructure, processing facilities and others. It is big political decision. We have to go back to having extension officers”. .
The human rights advocate said, “right now Nigerh has very few extension officers than what they used to have in the eighties and nineties all because of the structural adjustment programme (SAP) of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). They destroyed the fabric of our food system because we don’t have the extension officers anymore.
“These extension officers are the ones that will tell the farmers what to expect, the best crops to grow, what season, what method to use but now farmers are just left on their own. Nobody is supporting them”.
He said, “Governments need to invest in supporting our local farmers, support research institutes that teach how to grow crops that are aligned with nature and not the ones that depend on artificial inputs and genetically engineered crops that the likes of Bill Gates are promoting around Africa.
“We need to fund our research institutions let them teach agro ecology and know that farming can even make our soil healthy rather than destroying our soil with all these political fertilizers”.
On environment, Bassey said, colonial frameworks have continued to shape forest policies, displace indigenous communities, and commodify nature under the guise of environmental protection.
He explained that the concept of an “evil forest” was not rooted in indigenous traditions but was a colonial invention, noting that while communities had sacred spaces with cultural and spiritual significance, the term “evil forest” was imposed by colonial authorities as a way to undermine traditional beliefs, disconnect people from their land, and open ecologically significant areas to exploitation.
“Because people paid particular attention to those unique locations, those who wanted to destroy the foundation of our communities designated them as evil forests, and then set about destroying them,” he said.
He bemoaned the growing popularity of “blue carbon” markets-climate finance schemes that assign monetary value to the carbon stored in mangroves and other wetlands, describing them as a new form of land control that prioritises profit over people.
“Blue carbon doesn’t necessarily lead to deforestation, but it does displace people, once an area is designated a blue carbon forest, the person paying for that carbon now determines what happens there. That often means local people, especially women who depend on mangroves for livelihoods, are locked out.” He stated.
Mangrove forests, according to him, are not only rich in biodiversity but serve as crucial ecosystems for coastal communities. They provide fish nurseries, and are sources of oysters, periwinkles, and other marine resources, particularly for women engaged in artisanal harvesting”.
He warned that the framing of forests mainly as carbon sinks is a distraction from deeper environmental and social challenges, saying ,“no carbon in a tree will be there forever, forests should be protected for their intrinsic value and the roles they play in sustaining life and culture, not as carbon warehouses.”
Oh legacy of plantation agriculture, Bassey linked it directly to colonial exploitation and modern food insecurity, adding that plantations, originally built to feed export markets, continue to undermine local food systems and force communities into dependency.
“The idea of cash cropping is a colonial concept, you don’t have plantations for food. It’s oil palm, rubber, cashew; all meant for export, not for feeding the people. Our small farmers are sidelined, while plantations poison the land and people with chemicals.” He added.
Plantation systems, he noted, often employ people as labourers, leaving them too exhausted to farm for themselves.
He therefore emphasised the need to decolonise environmental policy and centre communities in conservation efforts, especially in forest governance, insisting that “we must liberate ourselves from the colonial mentality when it comes to forest preservation.
“The government must promote community-controlled protected forests. When communities know the forest is theirs to protect, they do a far better job than any state agency.”
