Environment
Minimizing the negative impact of environmental degradation
It is estimated that 80% of Liberian households obtain their energy from wood and charcoal for cooking in both urban and rural areas. Nearly a million trees are cut annually which contributes to a rate of deforestation of about 20%. Logging, slash and burn farming method, mining and road construction all contribute to deforestation and environmental degradation. These activities disturb the ecosystems in which pathogens reside thereby increasing the potential for new infectious diseases to emerge. Improved means of transportation reduce the time it takes for people to travel to and from urban areas and allow outbreaks to spread quickly. These outbreaks present serious challenges to the present weak healthcare infrastructure. Increase in investment in healthcare delivery will be critical to mitigate and prevent Ebola like outbreaks.
In addition, environmental degradation contributes to climate change which negatively impacts agricultural productivity. A consequence is critically needed resources for research to introduce crops that are tolerant to rising temperatures, drought and changing weather conditions. The Joseph Nyuma Boakai Foundation will collaborate with implementing partners to promote more efficient energy use and improve access to solar energy. It makes sense, cost wise, to pursue the foregoing activities as modules of integrated and reinforcing programs in targeted communities. Agriculture being the flagship would bring all the activities along. It impacts education, healthcare delivery, youth and gender empowerment, water and sanitation and the environment. Women make up the majority of agricultural producers, marketers and home providers in the rural areas. Improving their productivity and incomes would help reduce hunger and poverty. Improved educational facilities and healthcare delivery would encourage their children and youth to stay near home in the community and slow down the rural-urban migration. Improved healthcare delivery, water and sanitation and the environment would contribute to a healthier and more productive populace and a more peaceful and equity society.
The Joseph Nyuma Boakai Foundation will therefore
Collaborate with relevant agencies and Implementing Partners to minimize the negative impact of environmental degradation and deforestation on agricultural production by introducing drought and heat tolerant crops; Collaborate with Implementing Partners to promote green energy production through more efficient energy use and improve access to solar energy; Work with relevant agencies and Implementing Partners to mitigate virus-like outbreaks due to disturbances of the ecosystems in which pathogens reside, thereby increasing the potential for new infectious diseases to emerge; and Work with Implementing Partners, especially farmers, to understand the relationship between agriculture and climate change.
