Sustainability issues and Nigeria’s Agricultural Development Paradigm

This study highlights on the sustainable issues and agricultural development in Nigeria by looking at the theory of natural resources’ scarcity and its effects on growth and partly, on the principles of natural resources conservation. The environmental impact of continued population growth is felt through increase in energy demand, production, consumption and waste. Currently, Nigeria loses about 351,000ha of land to desert encroachment advancing southwards at the rate of an average 8km per annum. Bilateral relationships between poverty and environment were analyzed for understanding the real meaning of a sustainable human development approach. Sustainable development has currently come to the forefront of development studies. Linking rural economy, poverty and environmental degradation appears to incorporate the needs and aspirations of a developing country like Nigeria. The paper further examined the concepts of agricultural resources, and of agricultural hybridization of institutions, knowledge, methods and hybrids as means of juxtaposing conventional and traditional systems in agriculture. Thus, strong political commitments, will power and consistency in policy planning and implementation, are some of the means of improving and stabilizing both agriculture and the environment.