Introduction
Lake Chad has supported the people of the modern day countries of Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Algeria, Libya, and Sudan for centuries in what was once known as Lake Mega-Chad. Modern Lake Chad, which is composed of a semi-arid northern basin and a southern basin of a monsoon climate, is known as Africa’s largest freshwater reservoir in the Sahel region considering that it covers 8% of the African continent (Coe and Foley, 2001). Now Lake Chad’s very existence is under threat due to what the UN Food and Agriculture Organization has called an “ecological catastrophe” (Salkida, 2012). Lake Chad’s surface area has decreased by 90% from 25,000 in 1963 to less than 1,350 in 2001, one twentieth of its size since the creation of the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC) in 1964 (Coe and Foley, 2001). While arid climatic conditions and decreasing precipitation in the Sahel initially led to declining surface water levels and lake area of Lake Chad, the unsustainable utilization of modern irrigation systems for industrial agriculture and dams, regional population rise, competition over natural resources, the farming of high water intensity food crops, the diversion of water from the Chari River, and poor enforcement capacity of water resource management have amplified Lake Chad’s water losses (Brusseau et. al, 2019). Lake Chad’s dwindling resources have significant impacts on the survival of the 48 million people dependent on the lake by worsening rates of water scarcity, economic hardships, unemployment, poverty, climate refugees, and the insurgence of extremist groups (Brusseau et. al, 2019). Ecologically, the disappearance of Lake Chad has contributed to the lake’s eutrophication and declining habitats which support local ecosystems. These issues are expected to intensify as the region’s population rises in the future unless intergovernmental cooperation makes significant progress in sustainably managing Lake Chad’s remaining transboundary natural resources.
Natural Phenomenon Which Exacerbated Lake Chad’s Degradation
Approximately 7,000 years ago, Lake Chad was a part of a greater lake that spanned 400,000 square kilometers as evidentiated by elevation data from Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) which revealed the lake’s ancient shorelines in the region’s desert topography (Voiland and Stevens, 2020). Paralleling to the climatic circumstances of today, the region experienced low precipitation levels 5,000 years ago which led to the sudden aridification of the Lake Mega-Chad Basin and the final desiccation of Lake Mega Chad’s northern basin 1,000 years ago (Armitage et. al, 2015). As a result, Lake Mega-Chad’s northern basin became the world’s largest source of dust, which is theorized to further exacerbate the region’s aridity through its suppression of rainfall (Armitage et. al, 2015). It is likely that the rapid cessation of the African Humid period was the primary driver of Lake Mega-Chad’s decline in lake level and rate at which the decline occurred (Armitage et. al, 2015).
Precipitation levels and influx from the Chari River primarily supply present day Lake Chad’s southern basin with freshwater resources (Armitage et. al, 2015). Saharan catchments and overflow from Lake Chad’s southern basin supplied from the Bahr el Ghazal sill supplies Lake Chad’s northern basin with freshwater resources (Armitage et. al, 2015). Since the 1970s, declining precipitation levels, dry climatic conditions, high temperatures, high rates of evapotranspiration, and strong winds have not only caused declining lake levels, but also regional desertification (Ruppel and Funteh, 2019). It was discovered that long-term climate variability primarily contributed to the 30% decrease in lake area observed between 1956-1975 (Coe and Foley, 2001).
Anthropogenic Contributing Factors to Lake Chad’s Degradation
Coe and Foley estimated that Lake Chad experienced a four-fold rise in irrigation agriculture in the years 1983 to 1994 as opposed to 1953 to 1979, which only exacerbated the lake’s declining lake levels (Coe and Foley, 2001).The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC) have supported these findings by determining that Chad, Niger, Nigeria, and Cameroon’s inefficient irrigation and damming methods are largely responsible for Lake Chad’s reduction in surface area. More specifically, water diversion from the Chari River along northeastern Nigeria’s Hadejia and Jama’are Rivers for irrigation and damming projects have contributed to 90% of the lake’s declining water levels. State-sanctioned damming projects for hydropower generation are estimated to have reduced Lake Chad’s inflow by 50% and obstruct the migratory routes of fish which negatively affect their ability to breed (Ekperusi and Ekperusi, 2021). While the fact that the region’s population rose from 700,000 in 1976 to 2.2 million in 2018 led to more irrigation agriculture, the expanded use of high water intensity cash crops among farmers in the late 1980s was also a contributing factor to Lake Chad’s contraction (Born and Vivekananda, 2018). The insurgence of violent extremist groups such as Boko Haram also led regional governments to shut down movement across borders, thus limiting transhumance flows (a strategy employed during shortages) which further strain Lake Chad’s water and pastoral resources (FAO, 2017).
Ultimately, the Lake Chad crisis is a classic example of the tragedy of the common, a case in which individuals are incentivized to behave in ways that result in their personal benefit and against the collective benefit. This phenomenon was accentuated by the Lake Chad crisis being a case of environmental injustice because the region’s people were disproportionately affected to mismanage common pool resources due to high instances of poverty and a lack of funding for government services to properly enforce resource management laws. The tragedy of the commons problem could have been properly managed however, if local governments had successfully ensured equitable and sustainable access to Lake Chad’s resources and employed ecosystem-based management which would have managed human activities within the lake’s limits.
Lake Chad’s Tipping Point
Based on satellite imagery, Lake Chad’s surface area declined most dramatically between 1973 and 1976 initially in response to declining precipitation levels which began to fall from their historic average in the mid 1960s (Hansen, 2017). From 1976 onwards, Lake Chad surface area has continued to decline, but at a much slower rate as compared to the 1973 to 1976 decline.
Effects of Lake Chad’s Degradation on Humans and the Environment
Considering that 90% of regional livelihoods are sensitive to Lake Chad’s rainfall and resources, it could be said that the countries of Chad, Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon, Algeria, Libya, and Sudan depend on the Lake Chad basin for freshwater resources. With Lake Chad’s resources dwindling, the 2.2 million people that call the region home are threatened with water insecurity. As a result, fishing economies have declined and conflicts between fisherman and farmers over remaining freshwater resources have persisted among those who have remained in the region (Brusseau et. al, 2019). Furthermore, as fishermen, livestock breeders, and farmers face dwindling employment opportunities, 2.5 million people have become displaced as climate refugees (FAO, 2017).
Subsequently, tensions arose between displaced communities and host communities as the natural resources of their host communities fall under a state of stress. These factors have contributed to the regional rise of food prices (50-150% for maize and 76-204% for sorghum) and agricultural inputs, increasing unemployment, rising poverty, poor income alternatives, livelihood insecurity, and an inability to cope with shocks which has fueled the rise of emerging extremist groups and increased their retention rates due to financial incentives of recruitment (Brusseau et. al, 2019).
Regarding food insecurity, it is estimated that the Lake Chad Basin crisis has contributed to 6.9 million people becoming severely food insecure and 515,000 children suffering from severe acute malnutrition (FAO, 2017).
The over-exploitation of Lake Chad’s water resources and diminishment of suitable wetland habitat for local species have led to the decline and complete disappearance of animals like hippopotamuses, crocodiles, elephants, gazelles, antelopes, hyenas, cheetahs, caracals, addax, black rhinos in the basin (Mockrin and Thieme, 2009). Furthermore, the Kuri cattle, an endemic species present in the Lake Chad basin, is threatened with extinction due to the region’s reduction in vegetation. Reduced water levels have also increased Lake Chad’s alkalinity and anoxic conditions which amplify the impacts of eutrophication (Brusseau et. al, 2019).
Past, Present, and Future Advisable Management Methods of Restoring Lake Chad
The Lake Chad Water Charter of 2012 was implemented as a legally enforceable policy instrument which encourages regional sustainable development through the equitable management of natural resources, the settlement of disputes through the International Court of Justice, and the direct negotiation of LCBC’s member nations of Cameroon, Niger, Chad, Nigeria, Central African Republic, and Libya (Ruppel and Funteh, 2019). In 2015, the Lake Chad Basin Commission adopted a climate resilience plan which planned to educate livestock herders on accessing suitable grazing areas, fishermen on sustainable fishing practices, and water-users on more efficient water consumption methods. With this being said, it is advisable for local fishermen to employ more sustainable fishing methods than the use of the dumba trap which traps both adult and juvenile fish and does not allow fish populations to remain stable over time (Ekperusi and Ekperusi, 2021). Regarding agriculture, it is advisable to employ no-till farming and drip irrigation which would minimize water losses due to evaporation and conserve scarce water resources (Fisher et. al, 2019). Furthermore, altering the crops which are farmed in the region from high water intensity food crops (such as rice) to low water intensity food crops (such as wheat) may reduce the impacts of regional water scarcity (Ruppel and Funteh, 2019). For these strategies to be successful, additional data must be collected on all inflows and outflows of the basin with a particular focus on total irrigation withdrawals across various geo-spatial locations.
The UN’s FAO partnered with the Ministries of Agriculture and international NGOs from 2017 to 2019 using $232 million in order to strengthen resilience and reduce food insecurity in Chad, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Niger (FAO, 2017). During that time, FAO worked to improve food production and nutritional outcomes, increase regional sustainable employment opportunities, restore infrastructure, collect evidence on the scale of the problem, and conflicts over natural resource management (FAO, 2017).
As outlined in the Lake Chad Water Charter, it is advisable to utilize LCBC as a governmental tool towards enacting policy recommendations given its mandate of managing the basin’s natural resources and coordinating programs and projects for the effective management of the basin’s resources. In order for LCBC’s efforts to be successful, they must enhance their cooperation, update their legal frameworks regarding water resource protection, encourage environmental education, and establish systematic data collection, collation, storage, and dissemination (UNEP, 2018). Transaqua is a $50 billion 2,400 kilometer canal which would divert water to Lake Chad from the Congo River Basin is an upcoming plan to reroute water to the Chari River system from the Ubangi River through a Palambo dam (Nagabhatla, 2020). The project has been described as a method of stopping Lake Chad’s decline by LCBC and has been called the best investment that Europe and the United States can make in Africa by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari (Higgins, 2020). While the project has been projected to subside water conflicts and instability in the Lake Chad region, it has been criticized as a state-led solution that neglects local communities who have been negatively affected the most by the water crisis (Higgins, 2020).
While 75% climate models suggest that climate change will increase rates of rainfall and the frequency of extreme weather events in the Sahel, the cooling of the Atlantic ocean due to the melting of Greenland’s ice sheets may cause a decrease in regional rainfall (Born and Vivekananda, 2018). With this being said, an understanding of the scale and timing of precipitation variations is limited which serves as a debatably greater regional vulnerability than the Lake Chad’s contraction. For this reason, more climatic data should be collected in order to improve the predictive accuracy of climatic models so that the region can prepare itself for future rainfall patterns and extreme weather events which can make water collection difficult. Future climate-fragility risk assessments must also include improve their measures of the Lake Chad crisis on social costs because current models do not consider efforts to restrain terrorism and its recruitment, which overestimate the region’s coping capacities (Born and Vivekananda, 2018).
Conclusion
Lake Chad has suffered from intense degradation, the tragedy of the commons, and environmental injustice, particularly since the 1970s primarily due to declining precipitation levels, the unsustainable overexploitation of the lake’s natural resources mainly through the use of irrigation agriculture, population rise, and poor governmental capacity to enforce water management legislation. Given that the region’s population is predicted to rise from 2.2 million in 2018 to 3 million by 2025 and rainfall patterns are predicted to increase in variability, intergovernmental cooperation is required to effectively manage Lake Chad’s resources in the face of the tragedy of the commons and prevent further regional environmental, social, and economic decline (Born and Vivekananda, 2018). Intergovernmental cooperation can be improved with increased data collection on regional coping capacities, climatic variables influencing the accuracy of predictive models, and geo-spatial weather withdrawals for irrigation. As a result, governmental organizations will be able to improve their enforcement capacity of water resource management, recommend sustainable agriculture and fishing methods to the appropriate parties, manage conflicts over scarce water resources, and help local populations withstand climatic shocks.
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