OPINION
NAIROBI, Kenya (PAMACC News) - A high level ‘independent’ panel created to enhance the effectiveness of UN-Habitat has proposed the creation of a rival body, called UN Urban, that will take on a large part of UN-Habitat’s work if approved by the General Assembly of the United Nations.
The creation of a separate body to coordinate the sustainable urbanization agenda, which has been the role of UN-Habitat since 1978, will have a major impact on the United Nation’s presence in Kenya.
It would mean major job cuts for Kenyan and expatriate staff working at UN-Habitat. And these cuts will affect Kenya’s economy, particularly in Nairobi. The effects will not be limited to losses of millions of dollars in foreign income, but will also extend to income losses by those employed (4000) by UN staff, landlords, shops, restaurants, tourist facilities and many others.
The downsizing may go beyond UN-Habitat. It will also affect the United Nations Office at Nairobi (UNON), created primarily to provide services to UNEP and UN-Habitat, the two UN agencies headquartered in Nairobi. Currently Kenya is the only developing country to host the Headquarters of United Nations agencies. The whole UN complex in Nairobi houses over 4,000 staff. If UN Urban is created in New York, and UN-Habitat is significantly downsized, the need to maintain a large UN Office at Nairobi to service the two agencies, UNEP and UN-Habitat, in Gigiri will diminish.
The move to create UN Urban comes at a time when the United Nations system is undergoing major reforms aimed at cutting costs to achieve greater efficiency. These reforms include moving all UN regional offices to the cities where the UN regional commissions are located. In the case of Africa, this would mean moving the UN regional offices located in Kenya to Addis Ababa where the UN Economic Commission is based.
With the move of regional offices and the downsizing of UN-Habitat, the justification for a large UN presence in Kenya will be greatly reduced. Indeed, there have been past attempts to move UNEP to Europe, but these have been resisted successfully in the past and the government of Kenya played a critical role in keeping the organization in Nairobi.
Some see the hand of the current Head of UN-Habitat, Joan Clos, investigated for racist comments last year, as spearheading the effort to create the rival UN Urban body in New York as his term comes to an end at the end of this year. He is already making moves to place his cronies in New York and is believed to have constituted the panel that has come up with this recommendation.
The panel report also recommends reducing the level of country programmes on urbanization , which are most valued by developing countries which are rapidly becoming more urban. It is ironic that the work of the United Nations is aimed at helping developing countries, yet there is resistance in maintaining the headquarters of just two of the UN agencies in the countries that have the greatest understanding of the development assistance that is needed.
Kenya and other developing countries need to send a clear and united message to the Secretary General that our countries are capable, have the facilities, and have the intellectual capacity to contribute positively to coordinating important sustainable development goals.
Indeed, it is Kenya that produced Wangari Maathai ,an internationally renowned Kenyan environmental political activist and Nobel Laureate. Let us hope the Secretary General, who has welcomed the creation of the rival UN Urban, will listen.
But the African Group representing African nations thinks the recommendations will not necessarily serve to strengthen UN-Habitat and enhance its effectiveness, efficiency, accountability and oversight, as envisioned in the New Urban Agenda.
They cautioned against taking decisions based on the assessment report until their implications are fully reviewed and understood, with full participation and concurrence of member states.
They pointed out that Africa remains optimistic that the reform process, launched at the Habitat III conference, will provide practical recommendations on how to enhance UN- Habitat, including its management and leadership model.
They noted that Africa, being one of the fastest urbanizing regions of the world needs for a UN-Habitat that is fit for purpose to facilitate the effective implementation of the New Urban Agenda.
African nations are opposed to the creation of UN Urban, saying that is not viable. They recommend strengthening existing mechanisms, including the New York office of UN-Habitat, as a liaison office with other UN entities with converging mandates, resulting in increased efficiency and enhanced policy integration while avoiding duplication.
They argued,“UN Urban would create an additional layer of unnecessary bureaucracy and will have financial implications that contradict the general trend of zero budget growth within the UN. It would also complicate and duplicate operations rather than simplify them, in a manner that is counter productive and contributes to weakening UN-Habitat rather than strengthening it.”
According to them, the proposed governance reform package is complicated, inefficient and expensive; it is also self-contradictory and does not in any way contribute to strengthening UN-Habitat.
STOCKHOLM, Sweden (PAMACC News) - The era of exporting obsolete technologies to Africa in the guise of meeting the continent’s infrastructure needs in the water and sanitation sector is over, say African water ministers.
Ministers responsible for water and sanitation from across Africa made this declaration at the just concluded Africa Focus sessions of the ongoing 2017 World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden.
Speaking on behalf of the president of the African Ministers’ Council on Water (AMCOW), the Egyptian Water and Irrigation Minister, Dr. Mohamed Abdel Atty, reckoned that by the year 2030, global demand for water will grow by 50% and most of this demand will be in the cities. “The need for newer approaches and technologies for wastewater collection, management and reuse therefore becomes imperative” Dr. Atty says.
The Egyptian minister who also doubles as AMCOW Vice President for North Africa region declared that it has become a matter of urgency for Africa to set in motion, “the machinery for the implementation of new game-changing technologies, innovative institutional frameworks and well-designed business models for more effective wastewater management and improved water quality.”
Nomvula Mokonyane, South Africa’s Water and Sanitation minister and panellist at the Africa Focus sessions was vehement in her denunciation of obsolete technologies packaged as aid to Africa.
According to her, “Africa’s time to get organised and be proud of herself is now. We must avoid being a Guinea pig for life and arise as lead agent for transformation, adaptation and for new technologies, not for solutions that have been rendered redundant in other places.” “Technical capacity building, knowledge and education therefore have become key priorities for us as Africans,” Minister Nomvula said
The South African Water Minister strongly urged her colleagues to lead Africa on the path to “dedicated process and programme of progressive implementation, action and performance towards improved water security the sustainable financing.”
Reinforcing this position, Dhesigen Naidoo the CEO of Water Research Commission of the Republic of South Africa added that more than half of the innovative water related inventions in use across the globe today came from Africa and Africans. “Africa is the home of innovations in water and sanitation. All we need to do is to scale up," Naidoo said.
Another panellist at the High Level Ministerial Panel of the Africa Focus session and Nigeria’s water resources minister, Engr. Suleiman Adamu believes that “African solutions are in Africa and effective management of wastewater will not only improve the economies of Africa, but would also improve and promote good health of Africans.”
It is in this light, according to the minister, that “Nigeria is mobilizing resources through the Partnership for Expanded Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (PEWASH) initiative to address the nation’s Water and Sanitation Sub-sector in order to meet the Sustainable Development Goal-6 on water and safe sanitation in both rural and urban areas of the country.”
With home-grown technologies, Dr. Canisius Kanangire, AMCOW’s Executive Secretary envisions a prosperous future for the continent. From what we call waste, Africa can generate wealth, employment and food,” Dr Kanangire added.
STOCKHOLM, Sweden (PAMACC News) - African Water and Sanitation Ministers attending the 2017 World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden have underlined the importance of wastewater to the region’s aspirations for economic growth and sustainable development.
Speaking in Central Stockholm, water and sanitation minsters from the five sub-regions in Africa were unanimous in their resolve to adopt and promote effective wastewater management across Africa.
According to them, improved wastewater management is not only critical to achieving the Africa Water Vision 2025 and the Sustainable Development Goal on clean water and sanitation (SDG 6), but also to other goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
In an address to over 3,100 delegates at the annual water event in Stockholm, Engr. Gerson Lwenge, the Tanzanian minister for Water and Irrigation and President of the African Ministers’ Council on Water (AMCOW), recalled that African Ministers responsible for sanitation took proactive steps before the end of the MDGs era in 2015 by adopting the N’gor Declaration with a commitment that Africa will “progressively eliminate untreated waste by encouraging its productive use.”
Of equal importance to this commitment according to Engr. Lwenge, is “the fact that to actualize the potentials of turning waste to benefits, Africa needs to create the right policy environment and move from policy to effective implementation.” “It is on this basis that the High Level Ministerial Panel at this year’s Africa Focus Sessions will explore possibilities of using science to enrich policy making and increase policy implementation efficiency,” the AMCOW president added.
The Senegalese Hydraulic and Sanitation Minister, Mansour Faye disclosed that this year’s World Water Week and by extension the Africa Focus Sessions, will provide a global platform for him and his colleague Ministers to “discuss policy options and enabling factors that support the adaption and implementation of innovative wastewater management approaches and technologies as well as draw recommendations on how African states can move from waste to benefits.”
To Dr. Mohamed Abdel Atty, the Egyptian Water and Irrigation Minister and AMCOW Vice President for North Africa, AMCOW’s commitment to achieving an Africa where there is equitable and sustainable use and management of water resources for poverty alleviation and socio-economic development, regional cooperation and the environment remains unwavering. “With improved wastewater management particularly in the industrial and agricultural sectors, Africa will be on the firm path to food security and sustainable development” Dr Atty said.
Speaking on behalf of Water and Sanitation Ministers from Southern Africa region at the World Water Week, Mrs Jabulile Mashwama, Kingdom of Swaziland’s Minister for Natural Resources and Energy and AMCOW Vice President (Southern Africa), this year’s world water week provides an opportunity for Africa Ministers “to highlight the vision and aspirations of the water and sanitation community and stakeholders; share evidence and perspectives, as well as policy options on enabling factors that support the adoption and implementation of innovative wastewater approaches.”
From Central Africa region came the voice of caution as Léopold Mboli Fatran, Central African Republic Minister for Water, Mines and Energy and AMCOW Vice President for Central Africa underlined the fact that the quest to turn waste to benefits requires maximizing the resource recovery and reuse potentials in both sewered and non-sewered systems.
“If this is not well managed and supported by both government and development partners, the prospects of polluting the eco system, compromising water quality and undermining safe sanitation and hygiene won’t be ruled out” Fatran added.
AMCOW’s Executive Secretary, Dr. Canisius Kanangire agrees with the Central African Minister as faecal sludge and wastewater continually pose threats to human livelihood especially in African cities experiencing population growth due to rural to urban migration.
According to Dr. Kanangire, experiences by AMCOW member states show that wastewater can be a resource for irrigation with basic treatment and proper hygiene practices; sludge can be used as a source of energy, and fertilizers. “The productive use of waste water can generate income, development of micro enterprise and employment, as well as contribute to urban food and energy security. The threat therefore could be turned into opportunities for poverty alleviation” Kanangire says.
Wastewater: the untapped resource
The 2017 UN World Water Development Report states that most human activities that use water produce wastewater. As the overall demand for water grows, the quantity of wastewater produced and its overall pollution load are continuously increasing worldwide.
Over 80% of the world’s wastewater and over 95% in some least developed countries is released to the environment without treatment.
The report which dubs wastewater as the “untapped resource” observed that once it is discharged into water bodies, wastewater is either diluted, transported downstream or infiltrates into aquifers, where it can affect the quality (and therefore the availability) of freshwater supplies.
The ultimate destination of wastewater discharged into rivers and lakes is often the ocean with negative consequences for the marine environment. However, with improved and innovative management, wastewater can generate social, environmental and economic benefits essential for sustainable development.
AMCOW and the World Water Week
Established since 2002, the African Ministers' Council on Water (AMCOW) brings together Water and Sanitation ministers from 55 African countries to promote cooperation, security, social and economic development and poverty eradication among member states through the effective management of the continent’s water resources and provision of water.
As Technical Committee for Water and Sanitation of the African Union, AMCOW contributes to Africa’s progress towards sustainable growth and development by providing political leadership in the continent's efforts at achieving effective and efficient management of water resources through the provision of adequate and equitable access to safe water and sanitation
The World Water Week is the annual focal point for the globe’s water issues. Organised by the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), the event brings together experts, practitioners, decision-makers, business innovators and young professionals from a range of sectors and countries to network, exchange ideas, foster new thinking and develop solutions to the most pressing water-related challenges of today.
This year’s theme “water and waste: reduce and reuse” reinforces SIWI’s belief in the relevance of water to global prosperity and the attainment of a water wise world.
YAOUNDE, Cameroon (PAMACC News) - Cameroon’s government is touting the construction of several new dams along the Sanaga River, to increase hydro-electric generation as part of its ambitious plans to become an emerging economy by 2035.
The river is the country’s primary water source and already has two dams downstream from the new sites.
“These (new) dams will be the biggest (electricity) generation asset of Cameroon by 2024, providing a very positive impact on Cameroon’s energy system,” said Louis Paul Motaze, minister of the economy, planning and regional development, at the signing of a financing agreement for the Nachtigal hydro dam with the African Development Bank in Yaounde, the capital, on July 17.
With the economy forecast to grow by at least 5 percent annually between 2015 and 2018, Cameroon’s government says the hydro projects will ramp up power production to 3,000 megawatts (MW) by 2030, from a current level of 1,200 MW.
The decision to multiply hydro sites on the River Sanaga according to the Minister of Water and Energy,Basil Atangana Kouna is geared at reinforcing climate and environmental protection in the river basin area as well as boost electricity supply for surrounding areas. He says the new dams to be constructed will also assist local farmers improve on their crop production to alleviate poverty, malnutrition impacted by the effects of climate change.
Supported by the World Bank, the project that began in May 2017 is expected to be completed by July 2023 at a cost of US$ 28.70 million.
According a May 2017 World Bank Report,the development of hydro sites on the Sanaga River, will permit current and future electricity consumers to benefit from cheaper hydroelectricity compared to fossil fuel alternatives, improved the country’s new electrification programs as part of vision 2035 economic emergence plan.
Vision 2035 according to government, is to see Cameroon become a middle‐income, industrialized country with poverty levels below 10 percent by 2035. The strategy emphasizes the need for agricultural diversification, increased productivity, and large‐scale public investment projects with priority on infrastructure development in energy.
World Bank officials note “There is a growing demand for electricity in Cameroon. In terms of electricity distribution and access, only approximately 48 percent of the Cameroonian population have access to electricity. With Cameroon having the third largest hydropower development potential in sub-Saharan Africa, and half of it being in the Sanaga River basin, it is important to focus on the hydro development of this river and assist the country in its development of the sector for the benefit of the population,” said Elisabeth Huybens, World Bank Country Director for Cameroon.
A World Bank Funded studies on the impacts of climate change on minimum water flow in the river said it was potentially severe with droughts crippling not only the energy sector but affecting rain-fed agriculture, reducing crop yields by more than 15 percent in the last five years.
The Hydropower projects will enable regulation of water levels in the Sanaga River, benefiting the population of over 5million in the South and Littoral regions downstream, by making irrigation for this highly farming possible during the dry season, government officials say.
One of such hydro-power dam that has already started is the the Lom Pangar dam. Once construction is complete and the reservoir is filled in the next couple of years, the new dam on the Sanaga River experts say will improve the reliability of power supply and lower the cost for up to five million Cameroonians. The Lom Pangar project will also pave the way for developing the full 6,000 MW of hydropower potential of the Sanaga River by regulating the flow of the river.
However forest experts fear this multiple hydropower projects might entail sacrificing huge forest areas along the River Sanaga, a potentially problematic situation to the indigenous forest population along the river villages.
“We have observed a surge in investment activities in forest areas with the increased presence of Chinese and other foreign business operators in Cameroon, and this is disturbing because the rights of these forest communities are constantly violated, leading to clashes,“ says Benard Njonga, coordinator of the Cameroon-based NGO Support Service for Local Development Initiatives (SAILD).
However, government and development partners say that all the rights of the affected communities in the hydro dam projects will be respected.
“We are conscious of the socio-economic and environment responsibilities and the government is doing everything to address these,” economy minister Motaze said at a ceremony earlier this month to mark the beginning of construction of the second phase of the 30 MW Lom-Pangar dam in Belabo sub-division of the East Region.
Speaking at the same event, Akinwumi Adesina, president of the African Development Bank (AfDB), said Cameroon was rich in energy potential which could not only add value to the resources and livelihoods of the surrounding population but also accelerate regional economic integration.
The Lom Pangar plant will provide electricity to some 150 localities with an estimated population of 150,000, according to Theodore Nsangou, general manager of the Electricity Development Corporation.
However, environmentalists say it is unwise to concentrate a series of dams along the river. The 263 MW Edea and 396 MW Song Loulou dams, downstream from the newly announced projects, currently generate 95 percent of Cameroon’s electricity.
Augustine Njamnshi of the Cameroon chapter of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance says that increasing Cameroon’s dependence on hydroelectric power will put the country at risk of economic breakdown if drought hits the river basin in the future.
“This will be tantamount to an economic suicide leap,” Njamnshi said.
He recalled the social unrest in February 2008 triggered by persistent blackouts that provoked a wave of strikes across the country. The government said that the resulting riots led to more 17 deaths.
Njamnshi argues that the government would be better advised to pursue other renewable energy sources.
“With abundance of sunlight, Cameroon just needs the political will to turn its energy deficiency into energy surplus, accessible not only to the remote parts of the country but also to neighbouring countries,” he said.
