Information and communication technologies (ICTs) play major
roles in climate change mitigation and adaptation. This is increasingly
recognized within the climate change technology transfer negotiations.
According to the World Development Report 2010, the use of ICT is predicted to
reduce total greenhouse gases by 15% by 2020.
Beyond climate change mitigation,
ICT has a prominent role to play in realizing Nigeria’s Vision 2020 mandate of
building a large, diversified, sustainable and competitive economy that
harnesses the energies and talents of its people and guarantee high standard of
living and quality of life for its citizens.
The convergence between climate change mitigation and meeting growth
targets is particularly important to Nigeria.
Overtime, the impact of ICT on sustainable development has
often been underestimated by policy makers.
The importance of this sector can be felt in the construction of ICT
enabled energy efficient buildings and electric appliances, manufacturing,
logistics and power grids. Others include ICT enabled business models, markets
and lifestyles.
It plays essential role in monitoring, modeling, administration
and dissemination of climate change information and technology. It has other
indirect positive impact on the environment, for instance, through its role in
increasing general per capita wealth through productivity and GDP growth and
boosting the social well being of the populace, it helps in addressing the
poverty situation in the country.
It is clear that ICTs, as both general purpose and specific
technologies, are necessary in order to monitor, model, administrate and
disseminate climate change activities. Products include those used for
environmental monitoring e.g. for monitoring weather and climate change and
deforestation using satellite imagery, environmental modeling, computer
simulations of climate change, administrative processes such as
emissions/carbon trading schemes, and dissemination including information
sharing and environmental advocacy. Other examples include reducing physical
mail and paper use; online purchasing; use of e-government services;
video-conferencing; telemedicine; and teleworking and other remote working
arrangements.
Though, ICTs are instrumental to greenhouse gas mitigation,
it is also estimated that the ICT sector and ICT products are currently
responsible for about 2% of global GHG emissions. Unfortunately, the high rate
of growth in ICT penetration and increases in processing power means that,
without mitigation, the harmful contributions of ICT are likely to grow
quickly.
For ICTs to contribute to mitigation and adaptation of
climate change, the following actions are suggested at different levels: At the
national level, there should be a clear policy and regulatory framework for the
implementation of ICTs, which will impact on the level of education and skill
of potential practitioners. Nigeria should also make ICT education compulsory
in both secondary and tertiary schools to promote early use of energy efficient
equipment. At the global level, where there are international partnerships and
influence, synergy is required to implement technology transfer to facilitate
the fight against climate change. The developed country Parties should ensure
the transfer of software technologies which are easier and less cumbersome and
which will promote climate change mitigation in developing countries.
Encouraging ICT development in Nigeria will ultimately inspire local
innovations that will promote the use of sustainable sources of energy.
As Nigeria prepares its mitigations strategy, the role of
ICT in meeting a high economic growth and low carbon economy must be central.
In doing so, the linkage between climate change mitigation and meeting the
targets of the Vision 2020 will be strengthened.
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| Lawal |
Hamzat Bala Lawal is with the International Centre for
Energy, Environment and Development (ICEED) Abuja and an active member of the
Nigerian Youth Climate Action Network.
Sorceses: Daily Trust, ECO NIGERIA.
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