Given the environmental challenges arising from Climate Change, the Plateau State Government says it will begin clampdown on illegal tree fellers.
The Commissioner for Environment and Climate Change, Mr Peter Gwom disclosed while interacting with newsmen in Jos on Wednesday.
Gwom said that trees on the Plateau were grossly inadequate, and yet people kept felling trees.
The commissioner said that syndicates were cutting down trees across the Plateau, without knowing the harm they were inflicting on the ecosystem.
“We have issues on Plateau with regards to illegal tree fellers.
“I want to use this medium to discourage the people from cutting down trees on the Plateau.
“We’re trying to plant more trees. We don’t even have enough, and people are cutting down the few that we presently have.
“Very soon, a lot of enforcement will take place in that regard, to make sure we end the scourge of tree cutting going around the state.
“Look at Wildlife Park; what is happening today? We’re working with them very closely to make sure that we replant and stop people from cutting down trees over there,” Gwom said.
Plateau State is located in the North Central Zone out of the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria.
With an area of 26,899 square kilometres (10,386 sq mi), the state has an estimated population of about three million people. It is located between latitude 8°24′ N and 10°30′ N and longitude 8°32′ E and 10°38′ E.
The state is named after the Jos Plateau, a mountainous area in the north of the state with rock formations.
Bare rocks are scattered across the grasslands, which cover the plateau.
The altitude ranges from around 1,200 metres (3,900 ft) to a peak of 1,829 metres (6,001 ft) above sea level in the Shere Hills range near Jos. Years of tin and columbite mining have left the area strewn with deep gorges and lakes.
NAN
