UNESCO has reiterated its commitment to conserving Nigeria’s biosphere reserves, ensuring environmental preservation and discouraging human activities that fuel climate change across communities.

Jean-Paul Abiaga, head of the UNESCO Abuja office and the organisation’s representative in Nigeria, said this on Monday in Abuja.

He said that UNESCO was conserving biosphere reserves, particularly Oban in Cross River, Omo in Ogun, and Shere Hills in Plateau.

He explained that a biosphere referred to the global sum of all ecosystems, including all living organisms and their interactions with the environment.

Mr Abiaga added that UNESCO had engaged communities in the Oban, Omo and Shere Hills biosphere reserves in biodiversity business training.

A biosphere, according to the organisation, refers to the global sum of all ecosystems, encompassing all living organisms and their interactions with the environment.

The UNESCO representative said they had engaged in biodiversity business training for the communities of the Oban Biosphere Reserve, the Omo Biosphere Reserve, and the Shere Hills Reserve.

“The training is entitled Biodiversity Business in Oban Biosphere Reserve, Omo Biosphere Reserve and Shere Hills Reserve, Nigeria: A Means to Poverty Reduction, Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainable Development in Nigeria.

“UNESCO received $1 million from the India-UN Partnership Fund to implement the Biodiversity Business Project in three sites across Nigeria. The objective of the project is to support youth, women and local communities to develop biodiversity-related businesses,” Mr Abiaga said.

Speaking on the training for Omo communities, he recalled that they selected 10 communities to train in piggery, fish farming, and biodiversity businesses.

According to him, the goal is to help them create alternative livelihoods that generate income while protecting the environment.

Mr Abiaga also said that the biodiversity businesses training aligned with UNESCO’s global priority to balance biodiversity protection and sustainable livelihoods.

“This project combines environmental protection with income generation, which supports the UN target of protecting 30 per cent of global biodiversity on land and sea,” he said.

He said UNESCO hoped to scale up the project and continue collaborating with the Ogun government, other states and the private sector, which shared the same interest.

He mentioned that the programme, held between November 10 and November 15 in Ogun, was implemented in collaboration with the Forestry Research Institute of Nigeria, the National Park Service, and the Nigerian Committee of Man and the Biosphere Reserve.

The biodiversity businesses training is part of UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere programme, an intergovernmental scientific programme aimed at establishing a scientific basis for enhancing the relationship between people and their environment.

The programme combines the natural and social sciences to improve human livelihoods and safeguard natural and managed ecosystems.

It promotes innovative approaches to economic development that are socially and culturally appropriate and environmentally sustainable.

(NAN)