Knowledge

A. Providing Centres of Excellence

i. NEWMAP Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Environment at the University of Lagos. The Centre now gradually evolving will lead research and awards on the curriculum of Environment and Social Standards. It has linkages with Universities and other Centers of Excellence like FUTO.

Strategic Focus: The Centre is to commence with certificate and diploma courses that would subsequently serve as a prerequisite to more tenured degree programs and post-graduate courses.

The Center is to also serve as Institution for Quality Control, Regulation and Sanctions: This program presents an opportunity to create an oversight/supervisory body responsible for establishing standards, ethics and code of conduct for environmental and social safeguards/standards professionals and community of practice. This body would perform roles similar to those of professional bodies in Nigeria such as ICAN, NBA, NJC, NMA.

ii. Support to the Institute of Erosion at the Federal University of Technology (FUTO)Owerri, as a centre of excellence in the study of Erosion (Please follow this link: https://ies.futo.edu.ng/)

iii. Part of the support to the Institute of Erosion Studies(IES), Federal University of Technology, Owerri(FUTO), Imo State is the installation of Complete automated weather station and other monitoring tools to help the institute in regular data for her Weather Digest online.

iv. Learn more…https://ies.futo.edu.ng/category/monthly-weather-digest/

B. South-South Knowledge Exchange (SSKE) for Watershed Management, Infrastructure and Agriculture

NEWMAP supported the South-South Learning and Knowledge Sharing for watershed management, infrastructure and agriculture, in collaboration with the  World Bank task teams over 2.5 years to enhance South-South Knowledge sharing between China, India, and Nigeria.

Back in 2017, the China-World Bank Group secured a Trust Fund of USD 433,000. The Trust Fund, with additional support from NEWMAP, promoted important knowledge sharing and learning between China, India and Nigeria.

The focus specifically was on infrastructure development associated with significant land and gully restoration, agricultural development and climate-smart agriculture on restored lands, including applications of remote sensing, GIS, and Decision Support Systems (DSS) for more effective project management and M&E.

These activities primarily benefited the outcomes of the Nigerian Erosion and Watershed Management Project (NEWMAP), the new Neeranchal National Watershed Project in India and the FADAMA project in Nigeria.

Drawing on the experiences of foreign countries and building on available realities, The South-South Knowledge Exchange (SSKE) platform with the help of the World Bank Group occasioned a wealth of Knowledge from two giant developing economies to the doorstep of the two flagship projects in Nigeria;  to work together and explore a pathway to sustainable development tapping on the available innovative ideas, cutting-edge paradigm, approaches and successful experience for these countries In crucial areas of watershed management and climate-smart agriculture,  road infrastructure design; gully formation reduction and the application of satellite technologies. Critical successes so far include:

• International conference and Knowledge fair, held in October 2017 on
  geospatial applications to environmental and watershed management, co-hosted by the Chief Host, the Nigeria Ministry of Environment. The Knowledge fair tagged SSKE Knowledge Fair, coincided with the United Nations General Assembly declaration of October 4-10 as World Space Week. More than 300 officials and experts participated, including key speakers from the World Bank and leading scientific institutions in China, India, and Nigeria. According to Alhaji Ibrahim Usman Jibril, Honorable Minister of State for Environment – Nigeria, this was “a unique opportunity to leverage on space outreach and geospatial education to numerous stakeholders in the country.”Participants expressed enthusiasm for the event and requested the World  Bank to provide support for scaling up of the conference as an annual event.
• Study tour to China on Climate-Smart Agriculture in June 2018, with 27 senior officials and technical counterparts from two World Bank-supported projects in Nigeria dealing with watershed management and agriculture. The group visited China to learn about new approaches for climate-smart agriculture within a watershed management approach. The team visited the World Bank office in Beijing, and with several leading government scientific agencies.

Read more via the following link SSKE factsheet.