Thursday 29 November 2012

BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION 1


BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION

 Biodiversity conservation deals with the concept and scope of biodiversity, and the steps    to take towards the sustainable utilization of our natural bioresources with a view to maximsing their usefulness and making them available for future generations.

What is Biodiversity?

Biodiversity is a term coined in 1985 as a contraction of Biological Diversity ie “Bio” from biological and then “diversity”; both becoming “biodiversity”. It is therefore a modern term which simply means " the variety of life on earth". In concise term it is defined of the totality of different forms of life on earth. This variety can be measured in terms of genetic variation, species variation and ecosystem variation. These may therefore be taken as the verious levels at which biodiversity can be considered.

Genetic Biodiversity

All animals, plants and microorganisms carry hereditory materials called genes in their cells. A gene is a molecular unit of heredity of a living organism. It is a name given to some stretches of Deoxyribonuclic Acid (DNA) and Ribonucleic Acid (RNA) that code for a polypeptide or for an RNA chain that has a function in the organism. Living beings depend on genes. Genes hold the information to build and maintain an organism's cells and transfer genetic traits to offspring from parents. All organisms have many genes corresponding to various biological traits, some of which are immediately visible, such as eye color or number of limbs, and some of which are not, such as blood type, increased risk for specific diseases, or the thousands of basic biochemical processes that comprise life. There are numerous genes in the cells of organisms. For instance, it is estimated that there are up to 30, 000 genes in each cell in the human body. These genes under the influence of the environment gives each individual organism its own identity. The genetic make-up of each organism is referred to as its genotype and the outward appearance is called the phenotype.  Each of all the different species of organisms on earth therefore has its own gentotype and phenotype. In genetic terms therefore, biodiversity refers to variation between individuals of the same species. This includes genetic variation between individuals in a single population (a group of organisms of the same species), as well as variations between different populations of the same species. Genetic differences can now be measured using various techniques. These differences are the determinants of evolution.

At the species level biodiversity refers to the variety of species in a given region or area. A species is defined as organisms occupying the same geographical range and actively interbreeding and producing viable offspring. Species diversity can either be determined by counting the number of different species present, or by determining taxonomic diversity.

Details of how to determine species diviersity can be found following this link: http://www.colby.edu/biology/BI131/Lab/Lab07CalcBiodivers.pdf

A study of avifauna diversity in some airports in Nigeria used Index of Species richness (ISR) as follows:     

        ISR = S/√N                       Where ISR = Index of Species Richness;

S = Total number of Species in the area and

N  = Total number of individuals.

Source: (Menhimick, 1964)

At the ecosystem level biodiversity refers to the variation in the communities of plants and animals, together with the physical characteristics of their environment (e.g. geology, soil and climate) interlink together as an ecological system, or 'ecosystem'. Ecosystem diversity is more difficult to measure because there are rarely clear boundaries between different ecosystems and they grade into one another. However, if consistent criteria are chosen to define the limits of an ecosystem, then their number and distribution can also be measured.

Reference

Menhimick, E. F. (1964). A comparison of some species–individual diversity indices applied to samples of field insects. Ecology, 45: 859 – 861.

Thursday 8 November 2012


THE ROLE OF THE INFORMAL SECTOR IN SUSTAINED SANITATION SYSTEM TO PROTECT AND PROMOTE HUMAN HEALTH

By
 ABIODUN A. B. DENLOYE, Ph. D  
As an Environmentalist, Environmental journalist and Environmental science lecturer/researcher it is my utmost pleasure to be here as a guest speaker on this occassion of the ENVIRONMENTAL SANITATION/ADVOCACY CAMPAIGN FOR THE INFORMAL SECTOR OF THE ECONOMY IN LAGOS STATE with the theme – SUSTAINED SANITATION SYSTEM TO PROTECT AND PROMOTE HUMAN HEALTH.  

As you know, the environment is the totallity (that is everything) that surround us. This means our water (including borehole, well, rivers, streams, springs and even channelized water and pipe-borne water), air, soil and so on. Even we ourselves are part of our own environment, including our animals (including livestock or pets) and our plants (including those we farm such as vegetables, crops and orchards as well as ornamental plants). It is very important to keep all of them safe and neat for our own personal and collective good.  Regretably, while some of us take care of this environment, others care less about it, mindless of if it is destroyed or not. This explains why a forum like this is very good. I therefore thank the government of His Excellency Governor Babatunde Fashola, SAN and congratulate the Honourable commissioner of the Environment in this state, Mr. Tunji Bello for bringing out together in this forum so we can share ideas and sharpen our minds on our roles in environmental sanitation.

My duty here today is to address you on “THE ROLE OF THE INFORMAL SECTOR IN SUSTAINED SANITATION SYSTEM TO PROTECT AND PROMOTE HUMAN HEALTH”.  The informal sector in Nigeria refers to economic activities in all sectors of the economy that are operated outside the purview of government regulation. This sector may be invisible, irregular, parallel, non-structured, backyard, underground, subterranean, unobserved or residual. Informal economic activities in Nigeria include a wide range of small-scale, largely self-employment activities. Most of them are traditional occupations and methods of production. Others include such financial and economic endeavours of subsistence nature as: retail trade, transport, restaurant, repair services, financial inter-mediation and household or other personal services. Activities in the informal sector in Nigeria are highly dynamic and contribute substantially to the general growth of the economy and personal or household income. The informal sector in Nigeria can be divided into three sub-sectors namely

1. Productive sub sector

This includes all economic activities involving production of goods. Agricultural production, mining (excluding petroleum) and quarrying, small-scale manufacturing, building and construction are included in this category. They are specifically identified  in food production, woodwork, furniture making, garment making, welding and iron works and so on. Many of the artisans here in this gathering belong to this category.

 2. Service Subsector

This sub-sector includes repair and maintenance, informal education services, health services, counselling services and labour for menial work. Repairs and maintenance services include tailoring, vehicle repairs and maintenance, tinkering, carpentry and servicing of var ious household and commercial equipemen and appliances such as refridgerator and air conditioners. The informal health services, especially in the rural areas, include traditional birth attendants, herbalists and other traditional medical practitioners. There are also traditional spiritualists who offer counseling services.

3. Financial  Subsector

The most predominant type of informal finance in Nigeria is the Esusu” (Ajo). The general practice is that esusu associations contribute a fixed amount periodically (which may be daily, weekly, monthly or an agreed interval) and give all or part of the accumulated funds to one or more member(s) in rotation until all members have benefited from the pool.

There is no doubt that the informal sector of the economy in Lagos State interact with the grassroot and consequently has a great role to play in the sanitation in the state. In this matter (ie sanitation) we are mostly concerned with the production and service subsectors. Workers belonging to these two subsectors are the ones mostly interracting and conflicting with the environment in their daily operations.

Look around you, the tradeshops and workshops are located scattered all over the place, albeit haphazardly, without any particular order.  We can consider some of these artisans and their activities as examples at this forum as follows:

a.      Automechanic and allied workers: The auto mechanic, panel beaters, spray painters, air conditioner and refridgerator workers and many more make use of any available space in the street. The tradeshop are also not any better, in Lagos every available space along the route of passersby is a potential shop. Man even operate without shops. These are just to mention a few, it is pertinent to note that the activities of these artisans and trades, as a matter of fact get the environment polluted. For the mechanic workshop for instance there is hardly any toilet facilty. Any available bush, abandoned vehicle, disused and dilapidated building or any hidden corner around the worksop automatically becomes the toilet for the mechanic master and apprentice alike to urinate and defeacate. The clients too are not exempt; they fillow suit as soon as nature calls. That the air around these artisan workshops is rented with urine odour and decaying feaces is saying the obvious.  What is even more worrisome is the gale of unservicable vehicles that are deliberately abandoned in the mechanic workshop. Neither the owner nor the mechanic disposes of them. Such vehicles soon become the sign that shows the type of vehicle that artisan is specialized in. I must tell you that I often think differently. Every abandoned vehicle in the mechanic workshop tell the story that that the artisan in question failed to solve the problem of the vehicle and the bankruptcy of the owner. But you as the mechanic, should you not ask the owner to come and cart the vehicle away?

b.      Building and Construction Workers: Artisans whose work centre around buildings and construction works such as bricklayers, painters, tilers, plumbers, electricians carpenters etc are not any better. In their daily services, the arena of work is usually left very filthy with cigerette butts, sachet water bags, different kinds of nylon and paper most of which are soon carried by wind or other dispersal agent and scattered all over the place. Rubbles of tiles, paint and paint buckets, rollers, brushes, unused POPs, broken blocks and left over mortar (cement/sand mix) are left behind even after the completion of the work. These deface the environment in no small way.  

c.       Refridgerators and air conditioner (RAC) workers: The RAC workers also have their own share of roles in spoiling (polluting, defacing and littering) the environment. These include the household and auto RAC workers. You will not need to look around the shops for too long before you see the various sizes of disused fridge cabinets, spent gas cans, condensers and different other parts. Some of these are even the insignia indicating that this is the workshop of the RAC worker. The environment would be better without these litter.

d.      Vulcanizers: Talking about the insignia of the workshop, the vulcanizers are equally guilty. The first sign you see in his workshop are disused tyres as though they are for sale, but no, they are only indicating that you have a  vulcanizer there wether present or absent at that particular time. They you can see the water trough which is usually a cut section of a tyre containing water used to detected leakage points on tyres.

e.       Hair Dressers and Beauticians: The shops of many hairdressers are often located near gutters or water outlet paths. This is ostensibly to allow them easily let out their waste water. But where do these gutters and canals lead? No where, in many cases? They have been blocked and consequently become receptacles for verious pathogenic micro organisms.

f.       Printers: Printers are a major environment polluters. These they do in two ways namely improper disposal of paper off-cuts as well as lithographic films and in particular disposal of waste print inks. The lithographic films are not biodegradeable, they therefore remain undestroyed over a very long time. Indiscriminate disposal of the waste ink cause pollution of rivers, streams and other water bodies. Ink generally conatins Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), heavy metals amd non-renewable resources. The VOCs are released as ink dries with the evaporation  of the isopropyl alcohol (IPA) used as a damping solution evaporates at room temperature. The VOCs are colourless, odourless gases which are harmful to the environment, they contribute to global warming and the production of ozone, as well as being hazardous to pressroom workers where they cause damage. These printing ink are also toxic to fish and other aquatic life. When such fish are eaten by humans, we also get the chemicals.

The Role of Informal Sector in Sustained Sanitation

From the foregoing, it should be clear to us all that the informal sector have roles they play in polluting and causing problems for the environment. By the same token, workers in the informal sector of the economy also have roles to play in sustained environmental sanitation. These can be highlighted as follows:

1.      Self Education and mass awareness. We must recognize our negative attitudes and behaviours that introduce filth and pollutants in the environment. Some of these include indescriminate defeacation and urination in the sorroundings. I have noticed that government is doing a lot in the aspect of provision of public toilets in garages parks and markets. We need to identify these toilets and ensure that we use them. In this regard, there is need for governnemnt at variours tiers to do more, but the ones they have done, let us discpline ourself, teach our selves to use them. These can be done through the various mechanic associations, market associations and so on. The negative attidtudes also include inproper disposal of waste materials and parts. With respect to the different trades, these need to be identified and spoken about in our meetings.

2.      Enforcement of Public Hygiene. When we have identified the ways we introduce filth into the sirrounding, let us be our own watchdog and enforce strict compliance to hygiene norms. This include proper cleaning of our work place or shop or market stalls regularly, particularly at the end of each day’s work or trade.

3.      Use of designated disposal points or facilities. It is important for us to create designated disposal points or facilities. There are recognized waste dumps which government have created. We must ensure that these dumps are used to dispose of our wastes. I understand that you cannot use these waste dumps directly but throught the services of PSP waste managers who come to carry them at intervals. This is a very commendable initiative by government. Gentlemen and ladies, you must pay your waste disposal bills as you are served without default. In addition it is important that in our shops and places of trade or work we must make provision for disposal containers which can be securely covered or the mouth tied if it is a nylon bag. It should not be easy for pets, livestock or children to tamper with the waste bin and spill its content.

4.      Waste Recycling. This is a very important way to reduce our waste and management them. The shops of workers like the mechanics are rid with vehicles that are no longer serviceable. Such vehicles should be disposed of as scraps to buyers who would in turn use different parts for other things. Some workshops are visited by vedors who come around to buy various recyclable parts. This should be encouraged. The mechanic villages for example can have arrangement with these buyers to come at regular intervals that are not far from one another.

5.      Proper Signages. We must stop the display of the items we work on to indicate our presence. Proper signages must be displayed as prescribed by government. All the artisan associations must include this in the rule books and enforce them.

6.      Clearing of Vegetation and rubbles. All the weeds and other undesirable vegetation around the artisans must be cleared at regular intervals. These weeds serve as resting points for various cockroaches, mosquitoes, ants and some other biting insects which serve as vectors of various diseases. These insects invade the homes and other dwelling placed and become nuissance as they cause various diseases including malaria. Similarly the weeds habour rodents, especially rats. Rats will not only destroy belongings, but also transmit diseases such as Lassa Fever. Also building rubbles and such unwanted materials should be cleared aware from building sites especially after construction work.

7.      Strict adherence to environmental sanitation regimes. The markets have environmental sanitation days just as homes generally observe sanitation days as fixed by government. These sanitation days must be strictly observed. Drainages must be cleared and the waterways cleared to allow the flow of the water. Blocked drainages serve as breeding ground for mosquitoes and water holes for rats.

There are other ways which time will not permit us to mention here today. But if we play our own roles in  ensuring sanitation in the above ways, we should be able to maintane a neat and safe environment.
Thank you.

DENLOYE is the Director, Centre For Entrepreneurial Studies, Lagos State University, Ojo, Lagos.

ADDRESS DELIVERRED AT LAGOS CHAMBER OF COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY DURING THE ENVIRONMENTAL SANITATION/ADVOCACY CAMPAIGN FOR THE INFORMAL SECTOR OF THE ECONOMY IN LAGOS STATE WITH THE THEME – SUSTAINED SANITATION SYSTEM TO PROTECT AND PROMOTE HUMAN HEALTH ORGANIZED BY THE LAGOS STATE MINISTRY OF THE ENVIRONMENT, ALAUSA, LAGOS.