National Policy on Climate Change (NPCC).

This National Policy on Climate Change (NPCC) approved by the Nigerian Federal Executive Council (FEC) in 2013 as the overarching national document for climate activities in Nigeria, sets out Nigeria's response strategy to climate change for the period 2013-2020, as well as measures for the adoption of climate smart practices aimed at fostering sustainable development. It describes two broad classes of action, mitigation and adaptation for responding to the threat of climate change in the country. The National Policy moves from the considerations that climate change is aggravating environmental issues such as deforestation and land degradation, freshwater shortage, food security and air and water pollution; that in Nigeria the agriculture and food security, water resources, public health, and settlements sectors are specifically affected by climate change; and that the most vulnerable groups are farmers, fisherfolk, the elderly, women, children and poor people living in urban areas. The National Policy is structured as follows: Policy response approaches, sectoral adaptation and mitigation programmes; section 1: background; section 2: vision, mission and strategic objectives of the National Climate Change Policy Response and Strategy; section 3: sectoral climate change Policy response and strategies; section 4: implementation Plan, climate change Strategic Action Plan; Annexes, including: programmes, activities and implementation framework for the National Climate Change Policy Response and Strategy; glossary of technical terms, including: climate change; greenhouse gases; emissions; global warming; vulnerability; mitigation; adaptation; precautionary principle; clean development mechanism.
The National Policy’s efforts to address climate change issue in a responsive and strategic way is guided by a number of principles including the following: consistence with national development priorities; climate change addressed within the framework of sustainable development; use of energy as a key driver for high economic growth; mitigation and adaptation are integral components of the policy response and strategy to cope with climate change; integration with other interrelated policies towards promoting economic and environmental efficiency; adequate, coordinated and strategic institutional, policy and legislative response to climate change challenge, as a cross-cutting issue; promoting research and development, adoption of best practices, and capacity building programmes.
Concerning each key sector, the National Policy identifies specific adaptation and mitigation measures. Energy sector: enhancing energy efficiency in all sectors; strengthening private sector participation in the production and use of clean energy. Agriculture: strengthening integrated agricultural intervention plan to reduce the sector’s vulnerability to climate change and enhance its productivity for food security and poverty reduction, adapting the existing agricultural policies, laws and regulations to address the challenges of climate change in crop production, fisheries and livestock; providing early warning in a manner useful to the local farmers; supporting existing regulatory frameworks for innovative agricultural financing; enlarging the national food storage capacity. Water: use regulatory and fiscal measures to manage the supply of water including watershed re-charge; review existing institutional, legal and regulatory frameworks for water supply and wastewater discharge within river basins; upgrade canals and storage infrastructure to increase capacity and to reduce losses in transport and storage; exploit alternative water supplies such as use of seawater and brackish water through desalination, inter and intra basin water transfer; coordinating different interest groups in cooperating on River Basin Management. Coastal Areas: actively support the actualisation of the Integrated Coastal Zone Management; develop storm and flood protection; reinforcing existing studies on the function of coastal ecological system; management of flood control; rehabilitate degraded areas in the coastal zone. Forestry and land use: increase forest covers through afforestation, reforestation and prevention of deforestation; rehabilitation of degraded areas and increased tree planting activities, and promotion of agro-forestry; fiscal and regulatory measures to reduction wood utilisation particularly in constructions and charcoal production; sustainable use of forest resources to contribute to the livelihoods of the rural communities as they adapt to climate change.