Chinonso Kenneth (Lead Writer)
LAGOS, NIGERIA: Hamzah Opemipo’s farming dreams began to wither in 2019. The young farmer, barely out of his teens, was overwhelmed by worry and anxiety as his five-hectare rice farm in Ejiba, Kogi State, Nigeria, consistently produced low yields. Since 2017 when Hamzah invested over N600,000 into his rice farm, the planting season became erratic and unpredictable, disrupting his yearly farming schedule and resulting in six failed farming seasons.
“There is a farming calendar. You expect rain during a certain time of the year and a break in August. You expect to start harvesting towards the end of the year, which is going to be the dry season. But you’re entering October and it’s still raining, meaning you can’t go ahead with your calendar. That means you’re going to lose a lot and more,” Hamzah said.
As the weather pattern became more erratic, Hamzah felt angry, discouraged and disappointed until he lost his sense of hope, sold what remained of the rice farm and moved to Lagos in 2020 after six failed planting seasons in two years. However, Lagos wasn’t any better, he still experienced rainfall in December – the middle of Nigeria’s dry season which significantly disrupted Hamzah’s daily schedule. “From 2020, we have been experiencing rainfall all year round in Lagos even by December, we’re not even getting started on the temperature and the air we breathe,” Hamzah said
Other extreme weather temperatures, like heat waves and poor air quality, triggered the same old feelings Hamzah escaped from in his hometown, Kogi. “All these disorganises the normal flow and build a form of anxiety and depression. You start thinking and adjusting plans, and it messes with your mental state,” Hamzah added.
What Hamzah feels is classified as solastalgia or eco-anxiety—a kind of distress resulting from environmental change impacting people. This is caused by the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation on human activities which affects 59% of young people in Nigeria and nine other countries, a survey by the Lancet reveals.
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Eco-anxiety is an under-discussed topic in Nigeria, partly due to the stigma surrounding mental health in general and a lack of public awareness about eco-anxiety as a concept. Adedotun Esan, a public health professional working in the intersection of mental health and climate change, has identified a knowledge gap and believes that many Nigerians may be unknowingly experiencing eco-anxiety. However, this is changing. In the heart of Lagos, Nigeria, a mental health café offers Nigerians a safe space to learn more and discuss their struggles with eco-anxiety.
The ZenCafé: A cup of zobo and a conversation.
Attending the ZenCafé every two months is a source of relief for Hamzah, who is currently a product designer, as it provides an opportunity to share his anxieties related to climate change and listen to the experiences of others. These collective sharing sessions are a crucial outlet for him, allowing him to destress and regain a sense of hope.
Hamzah added that after three sessions, “I realised I’m not the only person who feels this way. I met people that share the same struggle and anger with me, and it was nice sharing with people who can relate on my level. At the end of each ZenCafé meeting, I always feel chatty, lightweight and energised. When I get home, I take a shower, and I’m ready to go six hours behind my laptop, working,” he explained.
The ZenCafé is a creation of The Eco-Anxiety Africa Project (TEAP), an independent project of Susty Vibes, and is hosted at their headquarters in Ogudu, a district in Lagos. Ayomide Olude, the project manager, explained that the ZenCafé was inspired by the LVN Climate Conversations project, a 2022 pilot program by TEAP and Stanford University that revealed 66% of young Nigerians experience emotions related to climate change.
“We got the idea from climate cafés that have been going on around the world where people come together in different cities to discuss climate change, but ZenCafé focuses on the mental health impacts of climate change. It is a conversational space guided by the principles of openness and non-judgement where people can talk about their emotional responses to climate change,” Ayomide said.
The first ZenCafé meeting held in January 2024 and holds every other month with an average attendance of 18 people. At each meeting, after arrival, ground rules are set, and a breathing exercise or embodiment process is used to relax participants before the day’s activities.
According to Ayomide, conversations at the ZenCafé are always guided by themes in the nexus of climate change and mental healthcare. As the moderator, she uses prompt questions in line with the day’s theme to get the conversation going and participants to unpack their thoughts and feelings.
As the ZenCafé meet-up comes to a close, participants shift their focus from sharing their eco-anxiety-related experiences to discussing potential solutions. The final portion of the session is reserved for a reflection period, where participants share their key takeaways. Afterwards, light refreshments such as fruits, biscuits, Zobo drinks, and fruit juices are served, followed by networking.
‘I felt relieved after my first ZenCafé’
Merit Nwachukwu, 25, finds the reflection segments of ZenCafé to be the most captivating part, as it offers a unique glimpse into the diverse impacts the meetings have on each participant. Merit, a climate change educator and content writer has also faced her own struggles with eco-anxiety, feelings of helplessness and alienation in the face of seemingly slow progress against climate change in Nigeria.
“Before ZenCafé I had this anger that climate change activism was going nowhere. The little environmental sensitisation efforts seem to be a waste. People were nonchalant. People are still nonchalant, but ZenCafé made me take things easier on myself. It has reminded me to breathe a lot and given me a sense of community that others feel the same. I got to talk about major things on my mind, and I felt relieved after my first ZenCafé,” Merit added.
For Ihuoma Okechukwu, 23, a big gully beside her apartment, formed by years of neglected erosion, caused her great distress. The gully, which became a refuge dump for the neighbourhood, kept expanding until it sunk a nearby building, forcing the owners to become homeless. This incident made Ihuoma very anxious, forcing her to take an alternative route to her house.
“It was nice to find a place to express these emotions and talk about them. It lifted a whole lot of weight from my shoulders. What that has done to me over time is that I do not have to fight with them when those emotions pop up because I’ve expressed them and let them go. We talked about it [at ZenCafé],” Ihuoma said.
What could be better
Measuring the impact of mental health programs such as ZenCafé can be challenging due to the intangible nature of mental health, making it difficult to establish concrete metrics. Svetlana Chigozie Onye, the project lead for TEAP, acknowledged this issue and stated that the organisation is working on developing a monitoring and evaluation system that will allow them to quantify the impact of ZenCafé.
According to Svetlana, the societal stigma associated with mental health in Nigeria means not everyone suffering from eco-anxiety is willing to admit it or seek the support they need and can get from ZenCafé.
Ihuoma also noted that the distance from her house to where the sessions are held sometimes discourages her from attending. To address this, ZenCafé is incorporating Zoom sessions to enable attendance from participants in and outside Lagos.
Adedotun Esan, a mental health and climate change expert, recommended that expanding ZenCafé across other states and hard to reach communities in Nigeria to provide localised and culturally appropriate mental health counselling for people in other communities vulnerable to climate change could be the key to providing climate change coping mechanisms for Nigerians.
“They [ZenCafé] can also broaden it to other concepts around mental health, not just climate action, because there is a lot of intersectionality across health, climate, finance, socio-economic status, so if they can extend it, it will be good,” Esan said.
Credits
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This report is published in partnership with Nigeria Health Watch through the Solutions Journalism Africa Initiative.
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The SolutionsPaper is a a multimedia outlet leveraging solutions and constructive journalism to spur civic action and participation in development issues across Africa.
