This special edition of Perspectives was compiled with the Heinrich Böll Foundation’s North Africa offices and the Transform Africa project. It is dedicated to the emerging conversation of alternative approaches that challenge the historical bias towards the industrialisation of agriculture and the food system as the main strategy to address food insecurity while preparing for a +2°C world.
This second volume of our Nigerian pesticides study provides evidence to support a process of withdrawing highly hazardous pesticides from the Nigerian market, based on their toxicity to human health and the environment, and to promote safer alternatives to chemical pesticides for crop and pest management.
As Nigeria pushes its agricultural sector towards more efficient production and a greater role in the country’s economic diversification strategies, this study surveys the pesticides that are currently in use, their effects on humans and the environment, and how policy influences pesticide use.
Industrial agriculture is responsible for both colossal environmental and climate damage as well as global injustice. It is high time for a socially and politically oriented regulation of the agrifood industry. We hope that this atlas will stimulate a broad-based social debate on this vital topic.