Climate Variability and Coastal Flooding in Nigeria

Increasing inundation of coastal communities as a result of sea level rise and the implications to
sustainable development and food security have become research concerns in the last two decades.
Sea level has been rising at an increasing rate as early as 1800s. (Church and White. 2006). McInnes
et al (2013) estimated that between 1993 and 2006 the mean sea level altimetry have been 3.3 ±0.4
mm/year The IPCC also observed that there has been a likely increasing trend in extreme high –water
levels associated with storms surges across the globe during the 20th century (Bindoff et al., 2007).
The projected estimated sea level rise due to increasing ice loss from Greenland and Antarctica by
2100 is between 75 cm to 2 meters. Yanagi and Akaki (1994) estimated that the China Sea will
increase the water level of Southern Vietnam by 13 cm in the year 2013 at the rate of 2.56 mm/year.