Climate Change and Extreme Weather Events Around Lagos.

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I live in Lagos and engage in small-scale farming, focusing on vegetables. I tried tomatoes, pepper, okra, pumpkin, watermelon and lettuce last year and had a great harvest. So, I thought of trying out the routine this year again but met the shock of my life.
First, it didn't rain at the expected time. I envisaged that it would be rainy between May and June, so I made a nursery for my vegetables but it did not yield like the previous year.

The rain of this year came like a storm, killing or uprooting some crops in some places or even washing them off the ridge at other nursery sites.

One of observations is that except for crops that are very close to the water source like swamps, other crops are struggling to survive, especially maize. This must have been caused by the repeated torrential rainfall in the region.

The climate around the world is facing a lot of drastic changes caused by human carelessness, industrial waste and natural metamorphosis. Climate change is an environmental challenge around the globe. All continents are facing this problem and the solution is not very near. In this post, I will take the climate change events around Lagos as a case study.

Lagos is surrounded by a body of water such that only a small portion of land is available for residential, commercial and industrial purposes. This small portion of land has now been distributed to meet with the rising demands for the usability of lands.

Another issue is the demography of Lagos. As small as the available land of Lagos, the mega city has nothing less than twenty million residents and it has the highest number of migration cases on a daily basis among top cities in Africa.

The high number of industrial outlets in Lagos is one of the major causes of climate change in Lagos and the most recent addition to those industries is the Dangote refinery which is now the most cause of the depletion of ozone layer in the region. Unfortunately, my residence is just a stone throw to the refinery. At night, the emission of carbon monoxide is clearly seen as it advances towards the sky in dark shades of smoke travelling on a straight line. Lagos, like many other cities, contributes to climate change through emission of greenhouse gases from various sources such as vehicles, industries and energy production.

Talking about vehicles, Lagos has the highest number of vehicles concentrated in one city around Nigeria. Out of those vehicles, a whole lot do not have road worthiness as they have had wear and tear over time which leads to emission of carbon monoxide into the atmosphere.

There is also the threat caused by deforestation. Tree felling is now a lucrative business in Lagos as high level infrastructure developers have invaded Lagos, buying virgin lands and turning them into estate for business and residential purposes. As such, the natural absorber of carbon dioxide has been removed, increasing the levels of danger to man.

The Island Lagos is facing heat because of the abundance of concrete and asphalt surfaces that absorb and retain heat on the one hand and the poor ventilation in residential buildings in Lagos. In recent times, most hospitals in Lagos reported the high number of deaths in parts of Lagos due to suffocation.

Close to my local government area, the dump site of Lagos waste was relocated which resulted in offensive odour around the town. I sometimes wonder if this has not been the cause of diarrhea and other airborne diseases. There is also poor waste management in Lagos. Many residents dump their wastes on the streets or even inside drainage which leads to blockage of drainages. This is another reason for the recent flood in parts of Lagos. The government had issued a warning on this matter urging residents to clear the drainages around their locality.

Another activity that has resulted in climate change is human pollution. In places like Oworonshoki and Makoko where people live in caraboat buildings made with wood, their human waste like faeces, urine and others are dumped inside the large body of water. This has affected aquatic life in the area and caused an outbreak of diseases too.
• Images 2, 3 & 4 are all mine