COMBATING AND MITIGATING DROUGHT AND DESERTIFICATION IN NORTHERN NIGERIA

Drought and desertification are natural hazards that affect man and his activities and if prolongeed may lead to disasters. Unlike other natural hazards, these two twin hazards (drought and desertification) creep in unnoticed and before one realizes their presence, a lot of damages have been done. Northern Nigeria, especially the part bordering the southern Sahara desert is proned to drought (and desertification). Sometimes, their occurrences are severe and bring untold hardship to the inhabitants like the 1978 – 1982 droughts. This paper attempted to review the hazards, causes effects and ways of combating and mitigating against them. Data were obtained from past literatures/researches on droughts. The paper shows that despite all efforts that have been made (and still going on) concerning the hazards, a lot still has to be done to fully combat or mitigate them. It is also realized that government has a role to play too. Other findings like man’s actions on the ecology of the environment, natural causes and ways of combating them are discussed in the paper.