Title:
THE IMPACTS OF ANTHROPOGENIC ACTIVITIES ON ATLANTIC AND INDIAN OCEANS IN AFRICA
AUTHOR: BABAGANA ABUBAKAR
AFFILIATION: ECOWAS/AFAO
E-Mail: babaganabubakar2002 @yahoo.com
SKYPE: babagana.abubakar
TEL: +234 8062220179
PERMANENT ADDRESS: ALHAJI BUKAR KUYA HOUSE, OPPOSSITE ABUROS MOSQUE, FEZZAN WARD, FEZZAN, MAIDUGURI, NIGERIA.
Introduction:
Africa is the second largest and most populated continent after Asia. Geographically it is located between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
Most of the Africa’s most populated and industrialized cities are located along the coast of the continent facing the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, example of such cities include Casablanca, Dakar, Accra, Lagos, Luanda and Cape town all facing the Atlantic Ocean and cities like East London, Durban, Maputo, Dar-es-salaam and Mogadishu are all facing the Indian Ocean.
As a result of the geographical locations of African Coastal Cities plus increase in their population, industries, sea port operations, petroleum exploration activities, trafficking of toxic wastes and improper waste management culture lead to the incessant increase in the pollution of the two oceans.
NATURE OF POLLUTION OF THE ATLANTIC OCEAN
i. The petroleum exploration activities going on along the coast of “Gulf of Guinea” region in countries such as Equatorial Guinea, Sao Tome and Principe, Gabon, Nigeria, Angola and others continuously causes oil spillages in the process of drilling, bunkering and discharging of petroleum products in the Atlantic Ocean.
Figures 1 A: World Map indicating the location of Gulf of Guinea.
Figures 1 B: The map of Gulf of Guinea in Africa.
The exploration activity in this region is in the form of vicious circle as illustrated below:
The vicious circle of the exploration activity
The problem of pollution in this region will ever remain on the increase because of the economic implication of oil exploration in the sub-region and in the whole World in general.
ii. The incessant degreasing of the Sea Ports “Quay Aprons” along the Coastal cities of Lagos, Duala, Libreville, Luanda, Cape Town etc are continuously polluting the Atlantic Ocean with chemicals which is affecting negatively the Ocean marine biodiversity of the Atlantic Ocean in general.
Figure 2 A: Showing a polluting African sea port.
Figure 2 A: Showing a polluted Ocean Shores.
iii. Local wastes generated from the houses located in the coastal cities are always finding their ways directly or indirectly into the Atlantic Ocean. In fact this explains why plastic containers are always deposited by the Ocean along the African beautiful coastal beaches.
iv) Gas flaring activities in the gulf of guinea region is another source of pollution and even source of canalizing the ongoing climate change across the globe in the region. Because a report released by the renown non-governmental organization on environmental pollution the Netherlands based Climate Justice Programme under the aegis of “friends of the Earth” indicated that the coastal region of Nigeria along accounts for 16 percent of the world’s total flare.
NATURE OF POLLUTION OF THE INDIAN OCEAN
i) Unlike the Atlantic Ocean where petroleum is the major pollutant, the Indian Ocean is polluted by Toxic and or Radioactive waste suspected to have been coming from the developed nations by taking the advantage of the unstable Somaliland political situation as reported by the United Nations Environmental Programme after the Tsunami disaster in December 2004 especially along the coast of Somalia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake_and_tsunami ).
Figure 3: Showing the Eastern part of Africa and Somalia facing the Indian Ocean:
Figure 4: Showing a contaminated container exposed by tsunami on the coast of Somalia.
Figure 5: Showing experts evacuating/cleaning the contaminated coast.
iii. Local wastes generated from the houses located in the coastal cities of Dar-ES-Salaam, Maputo, Djibouti, Mogadishu, East London and Durban among others are also polluting the Indian Ocean by always finding their ways into the Indian Ocean.
PROBLEMS GENERATED AS A RESULT OF THE OCEANS POLLUTION
i. Report released by the Netherlands based Climate Justice Programme under the aegis of “friends of the Earth” indicated that the coastal region of Nigeria along accounts for 16 percent of the world’s total flare in view of the above coupled with the increasing oil spillages in the African Gulf of Guinea region resulted in the rapid decline in fish, plankton, shrimps and other sea lives along the Coast of Africa facing the Atlantic Ocean.
ii. In the more recent time the revering dwellers living around the Coast of Gulf of Guinea region and Somalia’s Coast have been complaining of increasing cases of child respiratory illness, land degradation, well pollution, infertility and premature death.
iii. Geological strata of the Atlantic Ocean are adversely destroyed by the seismographic activities going on around the Gulf of Guinea region and Angola in particular.
iv. The general means of livelihood of the revering dwellers are often threaten by the pollution.
POSITION OF THE GOVERNMENTS OF AFRICA
Apart from the governments of the federal republic of Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Senegal and Tanzania that have either established institutes of Oceanography and or Environmental Protection Agencies, the majority of the African governments have shown no signs of checking the menace.
POSITION OF THE NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANISATION
The Netherlands based Climate Justice and the Nigeria Environmental Rights Action are the only non-governmental organizations out of very many that have shown signs of fighting this incessant increase in ocean pollution in Africa.
RECOMMENDATION
In view of the above situation I came up with the under-listed suggestions/recommendations:
i. International organizations who’s work that are related to Ocean, climate change and Pollution should send their teams of researchers to come and investigate the trend of this menace and proffer a possible lasting solution.
ii. The United Nations should use its capacity to educate and convinced the African Union to pass a resolution making it compulsory on all the African Coastal Countries to set up ocean regulatory bodies in their respective countries.
iii. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) should assist with her technical know how on how to educate the managements of the various Sea Ports in Africa on how to be degreasing their Quay Aprons without necessarily causing Ocean Pollution.
iv. The organization of the petroleum exporting countries (OPEC) should use its capacity to find a way in controlling the incessant oil spillages going on in the African Gulf of Guinea region since many of the Gulf of Guinea Countries are its members.
v. The World Health Organization (WHO), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and International Maritime Organisation should also jointly send their team of researchers to come and investigate the trend of this pollution especially along the Coast of Somalia and or Gulf of Guinea and proffer a possible lasting solution to the menace before it becomes too late.
CONCLUSION
The Author cited how the Atlantic and the Indian Oceans are polluted in Africa in relation to petroleum, industrial and Sea Port activities in addition to the Toxic waste Trafficking, however some governments and non-governmental organizations are trying in fighting the menace, but the increasing nature of the pollution of the two Oceans in Africa is calling for more research, assistance and commitments.
It was in view of this situation that the author came up with the above listed suggestions/Recommendations, which he believes that if implemented and adopted it will help reduce or stop the pollution otherwise this pollution will ever remain on the increase.
