DG warns youth against illegal oil refining

The National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA) has advised the youths to resist from illegal oil refining but should engage in more productive activities like planting seeds.

Mr Peter Idabor, Director General of NOSDRA, gave this advice at a South South stakeholders’ forum organised by Stakeholders Democracy Network (SDN), an NGO, in Abuja on Tuesday.

Idabor said that illegal oil refining in the country complicates existing environmental damage from pipelines.

"Instead of engaging in such criminal activities, it is better for such youth to engage in planting of seeds that could promote our environment and increase our economy.

"Such activity will also create carbon seed. My agency is trying to link with the Mango Society of Nigeria (MSN) and encourage the society to create nurseries, which we can use to replace some of this plant.

"So that we can generally put them away from this act that will increase carbon dioxide production in our eco-system,’’ he said.

He said that the agency is making every effort in ensuring that it creates awareness and educates the citizens on environmental issues.

Idabor said that the awareness would enable Nigerians to know the negative effects on environmental damage and how it could be controlled.

He said that one of the issues militating against the development of forest belt was lack of transparency and accountability.

According to him, if you are saying that you are creating new seasonings to planting new plant, you must also have an adequate number of boreholes to water such plant.

He stressed the need to increase seed multiplication programmes, adding that it would increase seed multiplications nurseries across the belt.