Food Security: 2019 NiMet Predictions and Socio-economic Implications in Nigeria II

Food Security: 2019 NiMet Predictions and Socio-economic Implications in Nigeria II

Since the beginning of 2017 when the new helmsman of NiMet, Prof Sani Mashi arrived and promised to make the agency provide excellent metrological services to the nation and the rest of the world, he has been striving hard to fulfil his promise. He was particularly concerned with the airliners as they enter Nigeria’s territorial airspace, they must get the best type of information that any meteorological agency can give anywhere in the world. He craved to provide best service worthy of emulation by other countries “especially those in the developing world – whether African, American or Asian – wants to develop their own meteorological agency, they will look at NiMet as their role model.” As he assiduously stride on the glorious path of history, the agency has continued to tread excellently providing metrological services comparable to similar agencies all over the world.

NiMet is today attracting global accolades from within and without. In discharging these services, the agency is purely guided by her vision, which states “To Make World Standard Weather Predictions and Services for Sustainable National Socio-Economic Development and Safety of Life and Property”. The agency’s mission stating “To observe Nigerian Weather and Climate and provide Meteorological, Hydrological and Oceanographic Services in support of National Needs and International Obligations” reinforces her lofty vision.   

NiMet services are applied in diverse issues on several human endeavors such as environmental sustainability, safety in air operation, land and marine transportation and increase in agricultural productivity tourism, health, defense, education, sports and construction. Other areas are Monitoring, management and mitigation of natural disasters. It is based on this premise that the 2019 NiMet predictions attracted wide range of stakeholders who will use the information to efficiently plan their various operations. What are the NiMet 2019 predictions? How reliable are these predictions? What are the socio-economic implications of these predictions?

The major services of NiMet are weather (temperature, rainfall events etc) forecasts and their periodic predictions. These services become more critical as the world is utterly facing global warming as a result of continuous greenhouse gas emission. The most devastating effect of global warming is evidenced on agricultural productivity as agriculture is directly and closely correlated with weather and climate conditions.  Extreme weather conditions have direct effects on livelihood, water security, health, land use and related issues to food security, environmental degradation and ecosystem collapse. These invariably affect the overall economic prosperity of the nation.  In fact, extreme weather event is seen as a single and most dominant challenge to the survival of humanity. The weather and climate information being produced by NiMet is therefore critical for combating climate change through adaptation and mitigation strategies. Thus, reliable and timely generation of weather information is an important tool use for the development of early warning system. The information enables good planning of agricultural activities with high reliability and guarantee for success. This was the reason that attracted high attendants to the NiMet public presentation of 2019 seasonal rainfall prediction (SRP) at NAF conference centre, Abuja on 24^th January 2019.

The caliber of participants in the 2019 SRP was drawn from different sectors of the economy: agriculture, education, transportation, military, tourism, and health from both public and private quarters. They included chief executive officers and top management staff of the various agencies in the aforementioned sectors as well as farmers and secondary schools students, christened “the young meteorologists”. The Minister of State (Aviation), Senator Hadi Sirika chaired the occasion and unveiled the 2019 SRP as well as released the 2018 climate review.  It was a mammoth gathering with high expectation from the NiMet valuable services. In addition to the high value allotted to the Services, there was also transparent confidence in NiMet prediction that made the gargantuan crowd to witness the annual event. In this regard, some representatives of states like Katsina, Kebbi, Jigawa and Oyo confessed of using the 2018 SRP to increase their agricultural productivity in the 2018 rainy season by more than 30%. 

Senator Hadi Sirika emphasized the importance of the prediction for the development of early warning system and ostensibly quoted one of the World Bank’s reports, “every US Dollar invested in the development of early warning system saves an average of seven US Dollars in the disaster management”. This means that the cost of the colossal damages caused by disaster as a result of inability to develop and utilize early warning system will be seven times higher than cost of disaster management. The minister added, “If the NiMet services are appropriately and timely used, the services of National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) will be greatly reduced and save unquantifiable lives and properties”. What made stakeholders have confidence in NiMet predictions?

Reviewing the 2018 NiMet predictions clearly indicated reasons for the stakeholders’ confidence in NiMet services.  In the 2018 seasonal rainfall prediction, NiMet focused on the rainfall onset, length of rainy season, end of growing season and annual rainfall. The country was predicted to experience normal to earlier than normal onset of rainfall with examples of towns like Sokoto, Bauchi, Kaduna, Lafia, Makurdi, Ado-Ekiti, Akure, Calabar, Eket to experience early onset. In contrast, towns like Yelwa, Bida, Abuja, Abeokuta, Lagos and Umuahia were predicted to experience late onset. Several other towns across the nation were predicted to either receive early, normal or late onsets of rainfall in 2018. NiMet excellently achieved an average of 91% precision in its prediction of 2018 rainfall onset of rainfall across the country.

On the rainfall cessation dates for the 2018 rainy season, most towns in the northwest like Katsina, Sokoto and areas surrounding the towns were predicted to experience early cessation of rainfall around 28^th September 2018. Southern coastal cities were predicted to receive their last rain of the year in December 2018. However, cessation of the growing season for majority of the towns in Nigeria was predicted to be normal with exception of Jos, Ubi, Uyo and Lagos that experienced early cession. NiMet achieved 91% and 89% precision in the predictions of rainfall and growing seasons cessation, respectively. On the annual rainfall amount for all the towns that received predictions, NiMet achieved an average of 65% precision making the overall achievement of 2018 SRP to be 84%. Similar evaluation for the same year 2018, day and night temperature was also reviewed. However, the performance of NiMet in temperature forecasts was rather low compared to the rainfall forecasts. The average predictions for the day and night temperature from January to April was merely 48% precision. The under prediction of temperatures in most towns was attributed to global climate change. Despite this low performance of NiMet in temperature predictions, several stakeholders scored NiMet performance outstandingly high and thus, reinforced their confidence. NiMet has to work hard to improve her predictions to achieve 100% precision.

The 2019 NiMet predictions covered rainfall onset, cession, amount and length of growing season. The predictions also covered temperature, dry spell, incidences of malaria, and cerebrospinal meningitis in the selected towns across the nation. On rainfall onset, the country is predicted to experience late onset in most parts of the country. The earliest onset is predicted to be around 7^th March in the coastal and south-south towns. This onset will progressively change northwards to cover the nation with towns at extreme north like Miduguri, Katsina, Potiskum and Nguru expected to have their rainfall onset on 16^th June.  On the cession of rainfall, northwestern towns will experience rainfall cession around 29^th September with several towns in the north having their cessions in October. Central and southern states are expected to receive their last rain of the year between late October and Mid November. In 2019, the length of growing season in selected towns covering the nation ranges from 109 to 291 days. Consequently, shorter growing season is predicted for most parts of the country such as Sokoto, Gusau, Zaria, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Gombe, Bauchi, Lokoja, Enugu and Ikom. Normal growing season is predicted for Shaki, Ado-Ekiti, Ibadan, Ondo, Akure, Benin, Port-Harcourt, Calabar, Owerri, Uyo, Umuahia and areas surrounding such places. What are the implications for this prediction? What is the mitigation strategy for the farmers in the affected areas? (To be concluded next week)    

   

Food Security: 2019 NiMet Predictions and Socio-economic Implications in Nigeria

Food Security: 2019 NiMet Predictions and Socio-economic Implications in Nigeria

Between October and November 2018, I published a 3-series article titled “World Food Day: Goalkeepers’ Report and Food Security in Nigeria”, where I extensively discussed the challenges to food security in Nigeria and strategies for addressing them. It was published in this column.  The article presented an in-depth analysis of the public presentation of 2018 Agricultural Performance Survey (APS) report by the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh on 16^th October 2018 during the occasion of World Food day celebration. The 2018 APS report provided the latest baseline information and status of food security in Nigeria.

In the write up, the 2018 APS provided a rosy picture of agricultural performance in Nigeria with marginal productivity increase compared to the 2017 performance. While the performance was being unveiled, however, the Goalkeepers’ report presented earlier in the same month of October provided a rather gloomy picture on Nigerian stride against poverty – food security. The Goalkeepers’ report indicated “Nigeria will have 152 million people in extreme poverty out of a projected population of 429 million by the year 2050”. Going by this figure, it means that Nigeria will represent about 36% of the total number of people in “extreme poverty” Worldwide. By the same year, 2050, Nigerian population is expected to overshoot to 450 million people, as the third most populous country in the World after India and China (India is estimated to overtake China in population).  This means that one out of three people in Nigeria will be among the people in the class of “extreme poverty” and food insecurity. Why do we have to worry about Goalkeepers report?

As discussed in the article, the “Goalkeepers Report” is an initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gate Foundation (BMGF). It provides an annual assessment report of how countries across the globe are making efforts towards meeting Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) targets. It acts as a mirror for the countries to look at their progress in their efforts of achieving SDGs. Those who fared well are celebrated as heroes who made a difference towards attaining the targets while those with below average performance are similarly shown what they should do to improve. Consequently, Goalkeepers’ report is a serious policy formulation document that cannot be ignored nation’s leaders globally.

In over two decades, APS has been an annual activity of National Agricultural Extension and Research Liaison Services (NAERLS), Ahmadu Bello University Zaria. APS is conducted in collaboration with public agencies and developmental partners. Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet) has been an avid frontrunner in synergizing with NAERLS for the conduct of APS annually. NiMet enriches the APS report with supply of rainfall and temperature data across the nation, which makes it handy for policy makers, agricultural planners and researchers.  How can Nigeria avert the gloomy picture painted by Goalkeepers report? This is why the annual NiMet Predictions become extremely important in undertaking an arduous task of avoiding national disaster: extreme poverty and food insecurity. Before the prediction, it is important to comprehend the concept of national “food security” and its implications in the nation building.

Food security has more than 100 explicit and implied definitions because of the technical and policy issues involved in its definition. However, the definition has evolved over the years to contain the necessary issues as guidance for achieving the food security. The 1974 adopted definition of food security was “availability at all times of adequate world food supplies of basic foodstuffs to sustain a steady expansion of food consumption and to offset fluctuations in production and prices”. In 1983 the definition was modified as “ensuring that all people at all times have both physical and economic access to the basic food that they need”. 1986’s definition was “access of all people at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life”. The 1996 World Food Summit adopted a still more complex definition: “Food security, at the individual, household, national, regional and global levels is achieved when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. The latest adopted definition that encompasses the different aspects of food consumption, access; nutrition of household, community and nation is generally used. This definition states that “Food security is a situation that exists when all people, at all times, have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life”. This means that access to quantitative and qualitative food, of high nutritious values that can meet dietary needs of people, at all times have to be guaranteed in a nation for such a nation to achieve food security.  For a nation like Nigeria with an estimated 3% annual population increase means that the food availability must increase by more than 3% to attend an arduous task of food secure nation. Thus, achieving food security requires excellent strategic planning for increased sustainable agricultural productivity across the nation. However, strategic planning requires timely and reliable information on climate generated through proven scientific methods. Generation, collation, analysis and dissemination of climate information are sole the responsibilities of NiMet, which are critical to achieving food security.

NiMet is a forerunner national agency mandated to generate information on climate and weather, analyze and use such information for prediction to support farmers, airliners and other interested stakeholders. NiMet predictions are increasingly becoming helpful in mitigating the effects of extreme weather conditions and avoidance of colossal losses of lives and properties. The import of NiMet predictions are better appreciated in view of devastating global warming and climatic change challenging the living condition of humanity. The effects of climate change on agriculture are diverse and tremendous. They include sharp changes in seasonal rainfall, temperature and humidity alongside increase in pest and disease populations, low crop yields and incomes to farmers. Climate change is directly responsible for wild diversity loss and ecosystem collapse with inconceivable consequences.  

NiMet has grown from relatively unknown agency to become a regular household name in Nigeria. On daily basis, tens of millions of Nigerians are glued to their television sets to listen to daily announcement of NiMet weather predictions across the major Nigerian cities and the rest of the world. The predictions that have become so useful to operators of the airliners, farmers, security agencies and several other Nigerians for the purpose of planning to avert losses and increase system efficiency. No doubt, NiMet is recording some marvellous achievements in discharging its mandates to the nation. This is in spite of its relative young age of 16 years in existence.

Historically, NIMET was established by an Act of the National Assembly – NIMET (Establishment) ACT 2003, enacted on 21st May 2003, and became effective on 19th June 2003 following Presidential assent. It has three core professional Departments, namely – Weather Forecasting Services, Applied Meteorological Services, and Research and Training (R&T). The support Directorates includes Engineering and Technical Services, Finance and Accounts, Administration and Supplies, and Legal Services, which also serve as Secretary to the Board.

The NiMet excellent prominence in service delivery can be credited to its leadership under Sani Mashi, an erudite professor of geography with vast experience. He was appointed as its Director General in January 2017. During his maiden media outing, he was quoted saying, “My vision for NiMet is clear; it is to make NiMet a world-class outfit. This is because the services we render are not just for Nigerians but for the benefit of everybody anywhere in the world. When foreign airlines are coming into the country, they rely on us. So, we want to keep up the service and better it so that whenever they go up, or they enter Nigeria’s territorial airspace, they get the best type of information that any meteorological agency can give anywhere in the world… This way, whenever any country, especially those in the developing world – whether African, American or Asian – wants to develop their own meteorological agency, they will look at NiMet as their role model.” Since then, the agency has continued to fare well comparable to similar agencies all over the world thereby attracting global accolades. What are the NiMet 2019 predictions? How reliable are these predictions? What are the socio-economic implications of these predictions? (To be continued next week)

  

Updates on Nigerian born Inventors: Celebrating the Invention of Koniku Kore

Updates on Nigerian born Inventors: Celebrating the Invention of Koniku Kore

In the last quarter of 2016 up to Friday, February 17, 2017, I published 5-series article titled “Nigerian Born Investors, their Inventions, Challenges and Opportunities. In the article, I stated that the list of Nigerian inventors and their inventions couldn’t be exhaustive. A huge country like Nigeria with a deep-rooted diversity and exponential increase in population, invention to survive daily challenges of life is the order of the day. Necessity makes people to think deeply on how to address their problems, constraints and threats against their living condition. Necessity is the major factor making Nigeria to churn out inventors in multitude. Ordinarily, Nigerians are naturally gifted with above average level of ingenuity, hard work and perseverance, when added to the prevailing difficult situation of their environment; the result is multitude of inventors. Invention is about coming up with a great idea, about turning the idea into a product, about making the product workable and making people to be aware about the workable product. The product should not only be acceptable by the people but should be sellable to recoup the cost of putting it on the market with a huge profit margin. Nigerian inventors have shown many workable products without moving to the next level of making people to be aware of their products. They are yet to make their products sellable, needless of making profit.  Invention is a difficult process, a time consuming event and often challenging and exhaustive to the inventors. Many inventors are disappointed after struggling for years with ideas they couldn't make to work. Today, some inventors have abandoned their great ideas out of frustration.

My previous on this subject article brought out the potential of Nigeria to lead the African continent in technological breakthroughs with her uncountable born inventors at home and abroad. In these inventors, lie the unquantifiable opportunities to make Nigeria excel in several human endeavors. These opportunities have potential to make Nigeria great among the comity of nations. However, potential is like a large fertile farm with good soil and abandoned water, without cultivation, weeds and dangerous reptiles will cover the farm, which must be avoided.

The article can be accessed: https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?tab=mj&blogID=4040876004067686701#editor/target=post;postID=8465991191574425538;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=81;src=postname. In the last two years, what are the updates on Nigerian born inventors, their inventions, opportunities and challenges?

There are several inventions made by Nigerians at home and abroad. Some of the inventions have been in existence longtime ago but are recently coming to lime light while few others were newly made. In the last two years, one invention that came to limelight, capable of making the seemingly ‘impossible’ possible in the global technological revolution is KONIKU KORE.

Koniku Kore is a giant invention of the 21^st century, it is a device, which can fuse live neurons from mice stem cells into a silicon chip invented by a USA based Nigerian, Oshi Agabi. The device is a next generation neuro computing platform that can provide uses in security, military and agriculture. An example would be that a single neuro-chip device could sniff out explosives without even seeing it. The creation of this seemingly synthetic brain is a breakthrough combination of robotics, neuro-biology, computing and bioengineering. The technology is also opened to a community of developers, with the potential to create add-ons. This means that the device, in addition its primary functions will serve as a platform for other application developers to use. Koninku Kore is an application for real-world issues such as detecting illness and terrorism threats and it offers a glimpse into how biology can be integrated into technology, and ultimately how the human brain can help technological advancements.

The Koniku Kore technology attracted media blitz with BBC and CNN leading in “breaking the news” during TEDGlobal Conference in August 2017 in Tanzania. The world is amazingly seeing a technology, which has created computer with artificial intelligence modeled on the exactness of the human brain. Whereas computer is better than human brain at complex mathematical equations, there are many cognitive functions where the brain is much better. Thus, making a computer to recognize smells would require colossal amounts of computational power, energy and high intellectual thinking. 

Koniku Kore is an amalgam of living neurons and silicon, with olfactory capabilities — basically sensors that can detect and recognize smells. The Nigerian born inventor, Oshi Agabi proclaimed before the international journalists at the conference, "You can give the neurons instructions about what to do - in our case we tell it to provide a receptor that can detect explosives." He envisages a future where such devices can be discreetly used at various points in airports, eliminating the need for queues to get through airport security. Instead of joining line for endless search at the airports, people will just be allowed to pass while the neurons-silicon computer clear or unclear them through smell. The same computer can be used for bomb detection.

Oshi Agabi said: "We merged synthetic neurobiology with traditional silicon technology with the goal of fixing urgent real world problems." Adding that the “technology could one day revolutionize airport security, enabling travelers to walk from their car directly to the aircraft." This will certainly address "One of the problems that plagues us right now is security,"

In an exclusive interview with CNN, Agabi said “Explosives have particles and smells coming off the individual and with our device you can tell, without requiring line of sight or contact, you can scan them at the time at a place of your own choosing and you can get into an aircraft and go about your business."

Additionally, Koniku Kore could be used to detect illness by sensing markers of a disease in the air molecules that a patient gives off. The invention could also be used to sniff out illnesses in the same way dogs can detect cancerous cells via smells. "In the same way that a dog is able to detect if someone has prostate cancer, the real question we ask is 'how does a dog do it?' We can clone that process on our chip, so yes in the same way that a dog can detect diseases or explosives at an airport, it's a sensory system, that is essentially what we recreate in our chip," Agabi says.

 Koniku Kore is a major indicator expressing advances in neuroscience; bioengineering and computer science, bringing out in-depth knowledge on how the human brain works allowing the scientists mimic brain system.  This advancement fuels the development of neuro-technology - devices that aim to mold the brain into computers. Before this invention, much of the current work was aimed at improving brain function, particularly for those with brain-related injuries or diseases.

Koniku means 'immortal' in the Yoruba language, one of the three most populous languages in Nigeria. The Koniku project started in 2015 and has already raised $8 million in revenue in 2017 as reported during the unveil of the project by its founder Agabi who stated that “we believe quite strongly that it's going to be run with biological brains that are made with synthetic biological neurons. That is the declared intention of our company: to build a brain."

Addressing ethical concerns and implications of creating humanoid devices, Agabi says: "I think it's unethical not to deploy any resources we have to fight terrorism. It is the urgent problem that we face as a species", adding, "That's not to say that we shouldn't be careful of bio-integrity".

Oshi Agabi was born and grew up in the suburb of Surulere in Lagos, Nigeria and obtained a Bachelors degree in Physics from University of Lagos. He went on to do further studies in physics and neuroscience in Sweden and Switzerland.

"One of the things growing up in Lagos imparts in you is grit," he says. "Lagos is a place that demands grit. Growing up there gave me an unconventional way of always looking at problems."

The world has to celebrate Koniku technology that aims to address two critical human challenges: security and cancer, a terminal disease by creating a device capable of detecting explosives and cancer cells. The inventions, like several other inventions made by Nigerians abroad, the Jelanis, Mohammed Bah Abbas and others are image booster for the country and the authority should provide unflinching support to these inventions.