They took part in a roundtable session that was marked by enthusiastic participation of policy makers, donors and NGOs. Around 12 persons attended the session, mostly policy makers and NGO-representatives. Munguti and Lam work closely with communities and therefore know all about their daily struggles for access to water. They both shared their stories that demonstrate how poor planning, water use and sharing of water resources can lead to chaos and are a major source of conflict and poverty.
At the same time, they emphasized that the only way forward in finding a solution is by involving communities in water management and in the planning of this resource. Over the last seven years, Nature Kenya has been working on involving local communities in the land use planning process for the Tana Delta. Down-stream pastoralists and farmers in this Delta β which, besides from being home to This struggle over water has even led to fatal conflicts.
In response to this water crisis, Nature Kenya supported and facilitated the local government in developing a bottom up water-use planning. Because of this effort, the local inhabitants of over villages were invited to participate.
The plan has now been adopted and launched by both the county governments as well as the national governments. For the first time, we have a mutually agreed plan: pastoralists know where to graze, investors know where to plan their business, and conservationists can protect the areas important to save species. Moreover, upstream large-scale interventions, such as dams, plantations and mining cause severe damage to the environment that local people depend upon for their survival.
In her presentation, she stresses the need to integrate bottom-up mechanisms to cope with and adapt to climate change in the policies of other NGOs and regional development banks, and to encourage multi stakeholder processes. Those institutes invest in my country, to make it more climate proof. However, these institutes often invest too much in the infrastructure, and not enough in the green and social side of climate change adaptation measures, leaving the country with only more and more roads and new dams.
