The International Water Management Institute, IWMI, says flood mitigation is a collective responsibility of the African continent.
The Climate Resilience Researcher group leader and Principal Researcher of the institute, Dr. Giriraj Amarnath stated this at a workshop organised by the International Water Management Institute for stakeholders in Abuja.
Dr. Amarnath explained that agencies like the Nigeria Meteorological Agency, NiMet and the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency NIHSA, have the excellent capabilities of forecasting rains but the most important thing is how the data users in the irrigation development are able to work with it effectively.
Earlier, in her welcome address the IWMI Regional Representative for West Africa, Dr. Olufunke Cofie said the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in response, has developed a Framework for Climate-Resilient Water Management that builds resilience into decision-making at all levels, across some linked domains for action.
“Globally, the frequency and intensity of heavy rainfall events have increased since the 1950s For each 1°C of global warming, extreme daily precipitation events are projected to intensify by about 7%.” She added.
“Flood risks will expand, with three times as many people exposed to the equivalent of a 100-year flood event by the end of this century. Surface water flows and availability will become more variable between seasons and years”.
“Soil moisture levels will decline in some critical farming areas, challenging rainfed agriculture and increasing irrigation needs. Drought has increased over the last five decades and the area of land under drought conditions will double by 2050, with between 0.5 and 3.1 billion more people experiencing water scarcity conditions” Dr. Cofie explained.
On his part the Director-General of the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency, NIHSA, Mr. Clement Nze who was represented by the Director of Hydro- Engineering NIHSA, Mrs Aisha Ibrahim, said the negative impact of flood will be on the decline by promoting better understanding of flood risks and ensuring that appropriate mitigating measures are deployed.
“The negative impact of flood will be on the decline by promoting better understanding of flood risks and ensuring that appropriate mitigating measures are deployed
appropriately, this is what the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency(NIHSA) stood for, that is, provision of reliable annual and seasonal flood forecasts and information for planning anticipatory and response measures for flood events.
“The issues of flooding affects everybody but in some cases we need to recognize the vulnerable how much they get affected and what is their capacity to handle mitigations. I believe at this workshop we will be able to identify some of these issues and how to work directly with these communities to understand what the flooding is to them”
He appreciated IWMI for hosting the workshop with critical stakeholders and for bringing other key players in flood forecasting, flood early warning and disaster risk reduction together to deliberate on strengthening anticipatory action through flood forecasting and early warning systems.
On his part Director General of NEMA, Mustapha Habib Ahmed said Nigeria witnessed a lot of economic damages and lost of lives to flooding in 2022, adding that this is the best time to strategize to hinder recurrences.
There were good will messages from the ministry of Agriculture, ministry of water resources, NiMet and the academia.
The International Water Management Institute, IWMI, that works with farmers and the public and private sector partners to co-design and pilot contextually relevant innovation bundles and their scaling pathways or strategies, influence policies and accelerate the transition to scale up innovations with demonstrated early impact.
Georgina Humphrey, Edited By Grace Namiji
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