WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY 2015 “SEVEN BILLION DREAMS. ONE PLANET. CONSUME WITH CARE” Greening Lagos: Bringing Urban Farming to a Meta City

The number of people living in Nigeria’s Lagos, the fastest growing megacity in the world, is expanding at more than 5% a year. By 2020, Lagos will have achieved a mega city or hypercity status (i.e.  city with over 20 million people). This Friday, June 5, is World Environment Day (WED). Has we join the rest of the world in marking the day. There is need put in place positive environmental action, calls on each of us to create change and put in place sustainable action to ensure the protection of the planet. The theme of WED 2015—“Seven Billion Dreams. One Planet. Consume with Care”—reminds us that we only have one planet, and that the Earth’s natural resources are finite, not unlimited. Today, the world population (the total number of living humans on Earth) was 7.244 billion as of July 2014 according to the medium fertility estimate by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division and it is projected to reach 7.325 billion in July 2015.

According to the above information, if current consumption and production patterns remain the same with a rising population, by 2050, we will need three planets to sustain our way of living and consuming. Presently, Twenty-six percent of meat products end up in landfills, which adds up to more than 47 billion wasted calories—or enough to feed 8,600 children for a year. Almost 30% of the Earth’s terrestrial area, comprising 2 billion hectares of forest and 1.5 billion hectares of grassland, has been converted to urban areas or cropland. According to estimates, almost a third of the Earth’s plants and animals have been lost since 1970. Current extinction rates are approximately one hundred times higher than the fossil record.

In the word of the U.N. secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, "Although individual decisions may seem small in the face of global threats and trends, when billions of people join forces in common purpose, we can make a tremendous difference." The theme of this year World Environment Day: “Seven Billion Dreams. One Planet. Consume with Care” is a reminder to each and every one of us the need to ensure sustainable consumption if human race will continue to part of this planet.

Meeting food demand and reducing consumption is part of the growing challenges facing cities around the world. Lagos has a fast growing mega city is faced with the challenge of meeting its food demand. Presently, the state relied on supply from other state. The various efforts by the government in meeting the challenges are commendable. However, like other cities around the world, urban farming can help in reducing meeting the challenges and also help in tackling some environmental problem such has urban heat effect, climate change and air pollution.

Urban agriculture such has: animal husbandry, aquaculture, agroforestry, Urban beekeeping, horticulture, roof top farming can help families meet essential food need such has tomato and vegetables. The state government should set up a training programme to engaged families especially full time house wives to engage in urban farming. This will not only meet family need but also contribute to the family income.