A Crisis of Access and Perception

Nigeria's national parks and forest reserves were designed as shared national assets — places for learning, research and recreation. But over years, they have become synonymous with danger. The 56-day captivity of schoolchildren inside Old Oyo National Park was merely the latest, most visible sign of a wider crisis. Many Nigerians now regard these protected landscapes not as wilderness to be enjoyed but as territories controlled by bandits and kidnappers.

This perceptual shift carries steep costs. Ecological treasures — including the Cross River rainforest, the Gashaka-Gumti mountains and the Yankari Game Reserve — are abandoned by law-abiding citizens, weakening the social and economic rationale for conservation. Without safe access, the parks deliver almost none of their potential benefits: environmental education, tourism revenue, local livelihood and national pride. The country’s extraordinary biodiversity is turning into a liability rather than an asset.

The comparison with Kenya is frequently invoked. There, deliberate policy turned landscapes like Nairobi National Park and Karura Forest into pillars of economic development, attracting millions of visitors, supporting research and creating thousands of jobs. Nigeria, by contrast, has allowed security failures to dominate the narrative and starve the parks of the attention and investment they need.

Beyond the Security Headlines: What Nigeria's Parks Could Become

The Insecurity-Park Nexus

The same remoteness and thick cover that make these areas ecologically valuable also make them attractive to criminal groups. Old Oyo, Kainji Lake and Cross River national parks have all featured in reports of abductions and armed attacks. The result is a self-reinforcing cycle: insecurity deters legitimate visitors, leaving the terrain more vulnerable to illicit occupation, which further degrades the environment and discourages the investment that could fund better protection. Breaking this cycle requires security operations that are not one-off raids but sustained, intelligence-led presences that make parks safe for wardens, researchers and eventually the public.

Kenya’s Mirror: What Deliberate Tourism Policy Achieves

Kenya’s success did not happen by accident. It is the product of years of coordinated policy that integrated conservation, tourism, infrastructure and community co-ownership. Nigeria possesses comparable natural wealth — from the mountain ecosystems of Gashaka-Gumti to the rainforests of Cross River and the archaeological wealth of Old Oyo. Yet none of these sites has been turned into a tourism or research hub on a scale that makes a dent in local economies. The gap is one of governance and political will, not natural endowment.

A Lost Generation of Conservation Ambassadors

When entire generations grow up knowing national parks only from crime reports, conservation loses its political constituency. The article’s proposal — that every Nigerian child should visit at least one park as part of school excursions — is not just a tourism stimulus. It is a long-term investment in public support for environmental protection. Without that support, budgets for conservation will remain easy to cut and illegal logging, poaching and encroachment will continue unchecked.

Reclaiming Natural Wealth: A Strategy for Government and Communities

  • Restore security as a precondition. The government must deploy dedicated, well-equipped ranger and security units to identified parks such as Old Oyo, Kainji Lake and Cross River, establishing permanent posts rather than intermittent patrols.
  • Develop basic visitor infrastructure through public-private partnerships. Access roads, visitor centres, marked hiking trails and eco-lodges at flagship sites (Gashaka-Gumti, Yankari, Cross River) can attract the first waves of domestic tourists, researchers and educational groups.
  • Integrate park visits into school curricula. Federal and state education ministries should fund excursions that allow secondary-school students to experience wildlife and ecosystems first-hand, creating future champions for conservation.
  • Make host communities genuine partners. Employment in park management, ecotourism enterprises and sustainable resource use (e.g. honey, guides) must be tied directly to conservation outcomes, so communities become the first line of defence against poachers and bandits.