By Ado Hassan, Sokoto
The 2017 Annual Conference of the Botanical Society of Nigeria(BOSON) ended Friday in Sokoto with a call on the federal government to commit adequate funds for plant- based research.
It also called for the establishment of a National Botanic Garden in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, as well in states across the federation.
The essence, the society explained, is to improve crop yields and carbon sequestration, for environmental transformation in Nigeria.
The call was contained in a communique signed and issued in Sokoto on Friday by Prof. Sanusi Mohammed, Chairman, Local Organizing Committee at the end of its 25th Conference
The theme of this year’s conference is :”Repositioning Botany for Economic and Environmental Transformation in Nigeria.”
The Society in the communique further pointed out that the baseline data on most of the economically important indigenous plants of Nigeria are in readily available format.
” Benchmark standard for Botany accreditation by the National Universities Commission( NUC), in all universities should include the establishment of a Herbarium.
”This will be a repository of plant biodiversity and tool for training in ecology,as well as systematics”, it explained.
According to the communique, database of plants of Nigeria and their categorization according to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora( CITES), listing are imperative for sustainable utilization of the indigenous flora.
” Tree planting is the effective way to mitigate the negative effect of indiscriminate deforestation,”’ it added.
Really their is need for constant government and general public attentions towards plant simply because the main basic need of mankind are source from plant such as food,shelter, clothes and drugs. Also plant play another important ecological role in preventing our immediate environment from some natura disasters e.g desertification.