A don of Environmental and Analytical Chemistry from the Department of Environmental Management and Toxicology, College of Environmental Resources Management (COLERM) of the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB), Prof. Olukayode Bamgbose, has stressed the need for increased public awareness and education to end the alleged indiscriminate, ugly and unwarranted human footprints on the environment. He made the call while delivering the 84th Inaugural Lecture of the University titled: “In the Footprints of the Environment: Every Contact Leaves a Trace on Our Common Future”, held at the Oluwafemi Balogun Ceremonial Building of the institution.
The environmental detective advocated for an increased government funding of universities in the country, noting that the government must be alive to its responsibilities in sustaining research in the identification of man’s footprints on the environment. He also emphasised that the government must, as a matter of necessity, devise means to improve the economy of the country with the determination to pass down dividends of democracy to the citizens, while affirming that ignorance could be surmounted through good education. Prof. Bamgbose attributed the heightened rise of deforestation on the high cost of fuel, which has had spiral effect on the cost of living, saying what could assist the green environment was almost disappearing. The Professor, however, recommended the utilisation of the six geopolitical zones as “laboratory complexes, equipped with state-of-the-art facilities that universities can draw on, with the aim of achieving its mandate of tracking man’s footprints on the environment”.