ABUJA  – At a meeting with Ban Ki- Moon, former United Nations Secretary-General, President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday in Seoul, South Ko­rea, said that Nigeria was already experiencing the negative fallout of climate change seen in the flooding in different parts of the country, as well as encroaching desert­ification and drought from the northern part.

The president made this observation at an audience he granted the former United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, on the sidelines of the First World Bio Sum­mit 2022.

The Nigerian leader ex­pressed delight with the co­operation existing between his country and the Republic of Korea especially in the area of energy supply, citing gas exports to the Asian country.

Describing education as a key investment in addressing unemployment and underde­velopment, the president also noted that health challenges must be equally addressed.

On his part, the former Secretary-General, who is the Chair of Ban Ki-Moon Foun­dation for Better Future and strong advocate for Climate Change remediation, sympa­thized with President Buhari

over the flooding, while calling for more investment to improve education, avert en­vironmental degradation and preventive diseases in order to meet the core Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). ­

He thanked President Bu­hari for attending the World Bio Summit, adding that his presence would highlight the importance of global action and cooperation in the de­velopment of vaccines and technology to meet the huge threat and challenges of pan­demics.

Noting that Nigeria is a very important country hav­ing prominent citizens oc­cupying sensitive positions in global organisations, Ban Ki-Moon called for more peo­ple-to-people engagements and cultural cooperation be­tween both countries even as he sought Nigeria’s support in Korea’s bid to host an EXPO in 2030.

Speaking on his pet proj­ect, the ex-UN scribe said his Global Centre on Adaptation is trying to mobilise resources to help developing countries fight climate change as he urged donor countries to fulfil their financial commitments to the Global Climate Fund.

Buhari and his guest also discussed the role of gender equality towards attaining a prosperous society while calling for an end to the war in Ukraine.

Nigeria To Become Global Hub For Vaccine Production, Distribution — Buhari

Meanwhile, President Mu­hammadu Buhari Tuesday in Seoul, South Korea, expressed Nigeria’s readiness to become a global hub for sustainable manufacturing and distribu­tion of vaccine and biological pharmaceuticals to support initiatives to keep all of man­kind safe.

The president also called for the speedy take-off of lo­cal production of mRNA vac­cines, after the World Health Organisation (WHO) selected Nigeria as one of six African countries to receive technol­ogy needed to produce the vaccines.

Addressing the World Bio Summit 2022, the Nigerian leader pledged commitment to global response to known or emerging pathogens, in­cluding the global vaccine assurance ecosystem and eq­uitable access for all.

He told the meeting jointly convened by the government of South Korea and WHO to discuss the future of vac­cines and Bio-Health across the globe that Nigeria would continue to explore bilateral, multilateral and other op­portunities for cutting-edge technology as a centre of ex­cellence for vaccine manufac­turing and distribution.

“As the mRNA technology allows science to shift attention to yet unknown disease threats, we see opportunities to address diseases that have plagued sub-Saharan Africa and third world countries for centuries.

“We believe biomedical sci­entists can dream of ending the scourge of malaria, Ebola, Lassa fever and various en­demic neglected tropical dis­eases through development and manufacture of effica­cious and affordable vaccines and therapeutics.

“Nigeria invites partners ready to support efforts to­wards the entire value chain of vaccine technology devel­opment in our continent, to consider working with us in Nigeria,” he said.

Noting that ongoing con­versations on the future of vaccines tend to support the decentralisation of capacity to produce essential mate­rials to respond globally to pandemics, President Buhari expressed Nigeria’s preference for a global warehousing and supply chain strategy to attend to the needs of most countries.

“We believe that this con­cept makes sense and we fully endorse the wisdom of stra­tegic and balanced spread of critical manufacturing capac­ity and essential stockpiles across the globe,” he said.

The president, therefore, declared that Nigeria is ready and able to offer itself for this initiative, due to its stra­tegic geographical location, strength of economy and mar­ket size derived from a popula­tion of over 214 million people.

He added that Nigeria’s comparative advantage is also supported from her expe­rience in human and animal vaccine production record since 1924, when colonial au­thorities produced WHO-certi­fied smallpox, yellow fever and anti-rabies vaccines locally – a technology that has been im­proved upon and being used in Jos, Plateau State of Nigeria.

The high quality of cur­rent academic and research work and potential in Nigeria is also note-worthy, he said.

The Nigerian leader used the occasion to reaffirm Ni­geria’s position on equitable distribution of vaccines, cit­ing lessons learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic and the unpleasant experiences of developing countries.

Describing the global re­sponse to the pandemic as discriminatory, the president demanded that the world must not allow the serious public health failure to hap­pen again.

“This Summit certainly opens up global conversations at high levels of government, on measures that are expect­ed to forestall recurrence of the unpleasant experiences that low-income and lower middle-income countries in Africa and Asia, especially, had to endure with regard to access to vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It must be said that ineq­uity in distribution of virtu­ally all requirements for diag­nostics and therapy was a key factor in the lack of capacity to produce basic or essential commodities, and the total de­pendence on imported goods.

“Although COVID-19 actual­ly threatened and continues to threaten all of mankind with no regard for race, region or economic standing, global re­sponse was not only segment­ed but discriminatory.

“If the pandemic had tak­en the course that was pre­dicted by some experts, there could have been an existential threat to sections of human­ity. Such a serious public health failure should not be allowed to happen again and lessons must be learned from it,’’ he said.