Nigeria to ratify Minamata Convention soon
The Federal Government of Nigeria will soon ratify the Minamata Convention on mercury, a top government official has said.
The government had on October 10, 2013 signed the Convention after it was adopted by United Nations member states.
The Minamata Convention on Mercury is a global treaty that seeks to protect human health and the environment from the adverse effects of mercury. It was agreed at the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on mercury in Geneva, Switzerland on the morning of Saturday, 19 January 2013 and adopted later that year on 10 October 2013 at a Diplomatic Conference (Conference of Plenipotentiaries), held in Kumamoto, Japan.
The Convention draws attention to a global and ubiquitous metal that, while naturally occurring, has broad uses in everyday objects and is released to the atmosphere, soil and water from a variety of sources.
Dr Idris Goji of the Federal Ministry of Environment, when asked recently at a stakeholder’s sensitisation workshop on mercury-free products held in Lagos disclosed that the government is making effort to ensure that players in every sector that the Convention will affect are carry along before it is ratify.
Goji also attributed the delay in ratification of the Convention to the change of government in Nigeria in 2015. “When new government came, they have to go all over again to brief them on the development”.
He explained that the Minister of Environment, Amina Mohammed, who will resume her new job as the Deputy Secretary-General of United Nations in March is making frantic effort to ensure that the Minamata Convention is ratified before she leaves office.
“We are hoping that the minister will push it forward before she leaves,” he added.
Goji added that Nigeria has been part of the Convention negotiations since 2010 and that the country is working towards its ratification and implementation. He disclosed that the federal ministry of the environment is the national secretariat of the Minamata Convention.
Major highlights of the Minamata Convention include a ban on new mercury mines, the phase-out of existing ones, the phase out and phase down of mercury use in a number of products and processes, control measures on emissions to air and on releases to land and water, and the regulation of the informal sector of artisanal and small-scale gold mining. The Convention also addresses interim storage of mercury and its disposal once it becomes waste, sites contaminated by mercury as well as health issues.
The Minamata Convention will enter into force once 50 countries ratify the Convention. As at December 20, 2016, 35 countries have ratified the Convention.
Kayode Aboyeji
