Climate Change and Conflict : Implications on Farmers and Herders Crises in Nigeria

In the last few decades, the phenomenon of climate change has dominated global discussions, due to its huge impact is on all ramifications of humans, ranging from development, wildlife, aquatic animals and most importantly human security and herdsmen and farmers crises, which is the focal point of this study. Climate change is the change of weather distribution either when it is too brief or last for too long which in most cases result in heat wave, flooding, drought and desertification, incessant volcanic eruption, depletion of ozone layer etc. The impact of climate change on food supply in Nigeria has been an issue of serious concern to the government of the country in recent times, but the conflict dimensions it brings between the pastoralist who are moving their animals from countries in Africa and regions in the northern Nigeria to regions less affected by climate change is the major issue of contention as it has led to countless of violent conflicts that has claimed thousands of lives most especially in the last decade. For instance, the rate of desert encroachment and reduction in water levels in the northern part of Nigeria including the massive dry up of Lake Chad has worsened significantly in the past few decades.Prior efforts and collaborations of previous governments and administrations with regional bodies, including attempts to actualize the Great Green Wall project of the Sahel, led by the African Union met a ‘still-birth’ for several reasons, similarly to prior international climate change mitigating policies such as the Kyoto Accord and later the Paris Agreement –which all failed to bring a tentative solution to the dilemma of CO2 emissions and greenhouse gases by human activities and the related conflicts that climate change carries.It is on these grounds that this paper attempts to examine the theoretical and empirical relationships between climate change and conflict in Nigeria, probing into the Fulani herdsmen and Farmers conflicts across the Nation. It fundamentally elucidates the role played by climate change in the worsening incidents of conflict between Fulani pastoralist (herdsmen) and farmers in Nigeria. The theoretical framework used for the study is Eco-Violence theory which posits that the immediate cause of farmers versus herdsmen conflict in Nigeria is the scarcity of natural resources, in this instance - land. The study concludes with numerous recommendations to both states and federal government of Nigeria and that for the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal - 13 (Climate Action), aimed at seeing global emissions cut down to zero carbon balance by year 2030 to be actualized, more needs to be done in Africa’s most populous nation, where cattle and livestock equally abound in staggering numbers, equally emitting greenhouse gases in their processes of digestion