Agriculture and land use change are major contributors to Nigeria’s total greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions. According to FAOSTAT (2013) estimates, agriculture alone, excluding land use change (LUC), accounted in 2010 for emissions of 48,154.36 gigagrams (Gg) CO2e, while the average annual emissions from net forest conversions 2000–10 are estimated at 180,228 gigagrams CO2e and recent estimations of emissions from drained cultivated organic soils are not available.

At the same time, agriculture also offers various mitigation options, essentially through enhanced carbon storage in soil and vegetation. The agriculture sector currently contributes 33 percent of national income and almost 70 percent of employment (CBN 2002; World Bank 2007), and is likely to remain a major economic sector, even if current stagnant or declining sector output is not reversed.

Agriculture features prominently in Vision 20: 2020 (FGN 2010a), the overall growth strategy adopted by the Government in 2008, which aims for Nigeria to become one of the world’s 20 leading economies by 2020. Vision 20: 2020 establishes targets for threefold and sixfold increases in domestic agricultural productivity by 2015 and 2020, respectively. These targets are to be achieved through (1) reduction of postharvest losses; (2) increasing yields (by expansion of irrigation and greater use of improved and disease-resistant crop varieties); and (3) expansion of cropland. Figure 1.1 illustrates the Vision 20: 2020 phased approach to achieve these objectives.