The Federal Government and the World Bank have moved to finalise a comprehensive blueprint to rescue Nigeria’s rapidly degrading water bodies and landscapes, with officials warning that millions of Nigerians in the north are already living with the devastating consequences of unchecked environmental decline.
The Federal Government, in collaboration with the World Bank and key stakeholders, has commenced the validation of nine Strategic Catchment Management Plans aimed at strengthening sustainable water resources management, restoring degraded landscapes, and improving climate resilience across several states in Nigeria.
The nine plans cover the Malenda, Oshin-Oy, Gurara-Gbako, Aloma-Konshisha, Benue-Mada, Sarkin-Pawa-Kaduna, Lungur-Gongola, Gaji-Lamurde, and Hawul-Kilange catchments, spanning ACReSAL states including Adamawa, Bauchi, Benue, Borno, the FCT, Gombe, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Niger, Plateau, Taraba, Yobe and Zamfara. Eleven of the 20 planned catchment management plans had already been validated before this week’s session.
Nigeria’s Minister of Environment, Balarabe Lawal, said the environmental crisis confronting the northern region was no longer theoretical but a daily reality for farmers and communities on the ground. Director of Hydrology Abohwo Ngozi, representing the Minister of Water Resources, warned that desert encroachment, degraded soils and unpredictable rainfall were already undermining food production and threatening the livelihoods of millions of farmers and pastoralists, saying: “As we meet here in Abuja, millions of citizens across the northern states are battling advancing deserts, unreliable rains, and shrinking water bodies.”
ACReSAL National Coordinator Abdulhamid Umar said the plans were not theoretical exercises but community-driven responses to real pressures: “They capture the voices raised during consultations last year. They identify real challenges — deforested landscapes, eroding soils, shrinking water sources, overgrazed lands — and offer practical, community-centred solutions.
Funded through a $700 million World Bank loan facility, the six-year ACReSAL initiative aims to address climate resilience across northern Nigeria, ensuring investments are tailored to the specific needs and natural resources of each catchment area. The project also aims to restore one million hectares of degraded land, with the FAO targeting 350,000 hectares under a parallel collaboration with the World Bank and Federal Government.
So far, over 92,000 hectares of land have been restored under the project, with more than one million Nigerians benefitting and nearly $2 million disbursed directly to 79 communities.
Delivering a goodwill message on behalf of the World Bank Task Team Leader Joy Agene, Director of Hydrology Henrietta Alhassan said the validation workshop marked a significant step toward strengthening sustainable water resource management, noting: “Effective catchment management is not only a technical endeavour — it is a cornerstone for resilient livelihoods, ecological stability, and long-term development.”
Officials expressed hope that the plans would be enshrined in law to outlast political cycles. ACReSAL’s Managing Director Chuka Ofodile said the intention was that the plans “have to be monitored, have to be evaluated, have to be sustained generationally, government in, government out.”