The Federal Executive Council (FEC) presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari, on Wednesday, refused to comment on the Tuesday shooting of EndSARS protesters the by military at the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, turned down the request by State House correspondents to comment on the matter during briefing on the outcome of the council meeting.
Rather, the Minister of Environment, Muhammad Mahmood, disclosed during the briefing that FEC approved the National Policy on plastic waste management in Nigeria.
He said: “The Federal Ministry of Environment today presented a memo on the National Policy on plastic waste management in Nigeria. Recall that about three months ago, we presented a memo on solid waste management and plastic being one of the compositions of total waste, has a significant place in the total waste regime because of its non-biodegradable nature and we have plastics littered all over the place, which is an environmental hazard to both humans and animals.
“What this policy seeks to do is to seize the opportunity of our paradigm shift from linear to circular economy. The standard procedure in the past was, you produce, you use and dispose and we just realised that we cannot continue to do that and plastic has lent itself to recycling or reuse. Therefore, what this policy intends to achieve is to capitalise on that property of it being reused.”
He added that already the Ministry of Environment has built some plastic recycling plants across the country, which would serve as a pilot scheme, adding that the private sector would have the opportunity to dominate the recycling plants.
The Council also ratified Nigeria’s membership of International Coffee Organisation.
This was disclosed by the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Adeniyi Adebayo, who noted that with the approval, Nigeria now has full membership status at the organisation although it signed the agreement in 2008.