ABSTRACT

Infrastructural development is one of the pivots for economic development of any nation and is crucial for social changes and development. These infrastructures provide basic elemental commodities and services that are essential for enabling, sustaining and enhancing societal living conditions. However, these developments could have negative impacts on the environment and if not properly monitored the initial goal of the development might be undermined; hence the need for Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). This study focuses on the Environmental Impact of infrastructural development in Edo state, with a view of getting the built environment professionals’ opinions. A total of two hundred and thirty-seven (237) questionnaires were distributed out of which one hundred and thirty-three (133) were recovered and analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences . The results obtained show that the Architects, Engineers and the Builders have the highest levels of involvement in the EIA process in the project monitoring stage, while the Quantity Surveyors and Land Surveyors were more involved in the review stage. The most significant impact factors of infrastructural development were identified to be destruction of vegetation and raw material consumption with RII of 0.90, 0.87 respectively. From the findings, lack of technical and managerial capacity, lack of credibility and transparency were the major hindrances to the Environmental Impact Assessment in the state. It is recommended that the state should equipped the agency with the necessary tools needed for efficient operation and also set up an independent body to serve as a watch dog to the agency in order to identify negative impacts and proper mitigating solutions appropriately.