Coconut trees might become extinct in Nigeria, in the next 50 years!
This assertion is according to a coconut processor, Mr Muheammad Mustafa who is cautioning against using coconuts as building materials substitute.
Mustafa, Executive Director, Doublem Enterprises Development Centre, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that using the tree’s trunk as planks and its fronds as roofing sheets was depleting the economic and ornamental tree, stressing that if people continued to cut and use it to construct buildings as currently being witnessed in the tree’s zones, its usefulness as an economic resource will run out.
Mustafa said “The coconut tree is meant to be used for food, medicine and industry and not for building houses, lamenting that the growing rate of the use as raw material in the construction industry will make the coconut tree go into extinction!
He stressed pn the dire need to sensitise the people to desist from cutting coconut trees for building materials.
Mustafa futher explained that several bye-products like brake pads, paving bricks and clutch discs could be got from the pulverised coconut shell, adding that automotive fuel could be extracted from refined coconut oil. He said that these were just some of the benefits of coconut palms value chain addition if proper attention was given to its development in the agriculture industry.
According to him, to boost coconut production, there is the need for high yielding seedlings that could produce more oil while stating that the major challenge is that the coconut tree presently produced in Badagry area does not yield oil like the ones from Ghana.
Mustafa said that the coconut extractors were being organised into groups to form cooperative societies so that they could access loans from the Bank of Agriculture and Bank of Industry.
He said the coconut extraction sector was big and highly profitable to accommodate youths, while advising young Nigerian graduates to take advantage of the abundant coconut resource in coastal areas of the country to engage in productive ventures rather than look for paid jobs.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria, the country currently produces 265,000 metric tonnes of coconut annually.
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