March 2, 2021
The 2020 UN Common Country Analysis has raised environmental alarms about grave environmental prospects bordering on climate change.
The report states: “Sierra Leone’s coastal areas are projected to be adversely affected by future incidences of inundation, waterlogging, increased flooding, erosion, and salinization due to sea-level rise.”
This projection makes the connection between the country’s low food production capacities given the looming threat.
The report adds: Increasing climate-related crises and environmental degradation affected food production, which is in a five-year low.
The report goes beyond the climatic condition and brings the COVID 19 situation as factor that accounts for the increase cost food.
“Moreover, COVID-19 measures have significantly increased food prices while decreasing food stocks, impacting food availability and access, particularly for poor households.”
The report looks back at the past to bring out details of environmental crises that presage a troubling future.
It states: Increasing temperatures leading to seawater rise and submergence of islands and coastal areas are the main climate change trends in Sierra Leone. These extreme weather events are becoming stronger and more frequent. In the last 15 years, intense and frequent storms, and flash floods have affected more than 220,000 people along the coast of Freetown. Floods account for 85 per cent of disaster‐related mortality in the country, followed by landslides, storms and fire accidents
Facts contained in this segment of the UN Common Country are buttressed by y. The Third National Communication to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the report makes a connection between the COVID 19 control measures and the laxity in responding to the environmental challenges.
“Policies implemented by the Government to contain the spread of COVID-19 seem to have inadvertently had a negative effect on the protection of the environment, biodiversity conservation, and, possibly, on conservation gains. Many environmental protection and conservation agencies in their effort to comply with the Government of Sierra Leone COVID-19 restriction measures scaled down their operations to protect and conserve the environment.”