BY BOLARINWA ABBEY ABIDEEN

Ekiti State Government has declared its intention to plant two million trees in 2024 for carbon sink to enhance the State’s environmental sustainability.

Commissioner for Environment and Natural Resources, Mrs Tosin Aluko-Ajisafe, said the state government is embarking on the initiative because of the adverse effects on the environment and humans, assuring that the state government would be unrelenting in efforts to mitigate all these.

The commissioner made the disclosure while delivering a lecture titled “Environmental impact of climate change: Causes, effects and adaptation” at the first plenary session of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Ekiti State Chapter, held at St. Philip’s Anglican Church in Aramoko-Ekiti.

Ajisafe, who was represented by the Director of Nature Conservation and Climate Change, Mr Babatunde Akinola, noted that Ekiti State was vulnerable to climate change, like other states in the country, so it was taking steps to mitigate it.

The Commissioner said: “Although climate change may not kill people directly, it imposes major threats such as extreme heat stress/waves, drought, floods, wildfires, reduction in food supplies, water scarcity, loss of jobs and abnormal environmental conditions.”

She stressed the importance of vulnerability assessments, implementing flood alert and defence systems and the construction of dams and waterways.