Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Summary
• The global theme of the 2018 World Wetland Day: ‘Wetlands for a Sustainable Urban Future’ has been chosen to raise
awareness about how urban wetlands contribute to the future of sustainable cities. The national slogan is ‘Urban wetlands:
prized land, not wasteland.’
• Uganda will mark this Year’s Wetlands day in Arua Municipality in North western Uganda, one of the districts where human
pressures are putting an amassed impact on the remaining fragile urban wetland and forest ecosystems.
• Uganda’s Vision 2040 recognizes that climate change affects all sectors of Uganda’s economy, making the need for preparedness
inevitable through adaptation and mitigation strategies in all sectors to ensure that the country is resilient to the adverse impact of
climate change.
• In line with the 2018 World Wetlands Day theme, Uganda’s Climate Change Policy (2015) prioritises provision of adequate support
for policies and programmes that take into account interactions between population dynamics, climate change and
development. With regard to wetlands, this Policy has both adaptation and mitigation sub-priorities as wetlands contribute
to community adaptation as well as mitigation of climate change impacts. This is through provisioning of goods and services
and storage of emissions (i.e. carbon-dioxide) in above and below ground carbon stocks.
• Uganda’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) prioritizes adaptation through a commitment to undertake a range of improved
land use management practices in the forestry, wetlands and agriculture sectors. Therefore, wetlands management plays a key part
of the planned climate interventions under both the planned adaptation and mitigation priorities under the NDC
• However, there are several challenges to wetlands for a sustainable future including: the unregulated growing demand for building
and construction materials which have resulted into sand mining activities, which are operating in a legislative vacuum. A
case in point is the unregulated sand mining in Lwera wetland in Masaka district among other wetlands across the country.
• This Policy brief makes recommendations to different actors including: Government (Ministry of Water and Environment / Wetlands
Management Department, Local authorities, the National Environment Management Authority, Civil Society and other actors
to address these challenges.
• In particular, the recommendation to protect the existing wetland acreage and gradually scaling it up as Uganda implements its
NDC, is in line with the intention to design and implement 15 Ramsar sites and Framework wetland management plans. This
will contribute to adaptive capacity of Uganda’s agriculture and water sectors, given that Uganda’s urban wetland cover
is a potential carbon sink that can ratchet the country’s NDC ambition under the Paris Agreement.
• Similarly the Ministry of Water, Local authorities, CSOs and other actors should take advantage of early lessons and inspiration from
the maiden Green Climate Fund project, to secure more interventions in support of urban wetland conservation for increased
adaptation and community resilience building, given the fast growing population that is already straining the existing urban wetland
cover.
Photo Source: UCSD
1.0 Introduction
The global theme of the 2018 World Wetland Day is ‘Wetlands for a Sustainable
Urban Future’ has been chosen to raise awareness about how urban wetlands
contribute to the future of sustainable cities. Wetlands provide many ecosystem
services in addition to a net carbon sequestration function (William J. Mitsch et.
al, 2011).
In Uganda, this theme is important to reflect on, due to rapid loss of these important
natural resources that act to cushion the economy and the fast growing urban
population against the increasingly unpredictable impacts of climate change. The
choice of the Uganda national celebrations to take place in Arua district is timely,
Urban wetlands make as human pressures are putting an amassed impact on the remaining fragile
cities liveable in many wetland and forest ecosystems on the outskirts of Arua Municipality
important ways. They (The Daily Monitor, June 2017).
reduce flooding, replenish
Urban wetlands make cities liveable in many important ways. They reduce
drinking water, filter
flooding, replenish drinking water, filter waste, provide urban green spaces, and
waste, provide urban are a source of livelihoods. These wetland benefits grow ever more crucial as the
green spaces, and are a number of people living in cities worldwide, has now passed the 4 billion mark
source of livelihoods. and continues to rise.
Uganda’s Vision 2040 (National Planning Authority, 2007) recognizes that climate
change affects all sectors of Uganda’s economy, making the need for preparedness
inevitable through adaptation and mitigation strategies in all sectors to ensure
that the country is resilient to the adverse impact of climate change. In addition,
developing guidelines for mainstreaming climate change in sectoral and local
government plans and budgets (2014) are recognised.
During the Financial Year 2016/17, the Ministry of Water and Environment
demarcated 168 Kms of critical wetlands in Hoima, Kisoro, Jinja, Iganga, Arua,
Gulu, Alebtong, Lira and Masindi Districts, and restored a total of 476 Hectares
(ha) of degraded wetlands in the districts of Kiruhura (150ha), Soroti (13ha), Rakai
(145ha), Isingiro (40ha), Bududa (10ha), Budaka (28ha), Bulambuli (80ha), Omoro
(6ha), and Lira (10ha).
However, an additional Ug shs 60bn required annually, remain as a funding gap
for tree planting, restoration and enforcement activities on fragile ecosystems
(Ministry Water and Environment Policy Statement 2017/18 & Uganda Water and Adaptation: the process of
Environment Sector Performance Report 2017). adjusting to the impacts of a
changing climate, seeking to
Under the Uganda National Climate Change Policy (NCCP) (2015), a climate change
moderate or avoid harm, and
resilient and low carbon climate development pathway, is expected to help meet
Vision 2040’s goals through strategies and actions that address both sustainable exploit beneficial opportunities
development and climate change. This pathway shall also help the Government
achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and other internationally Mitigation: efforts to
agreed development goals without compromising the environment and the
reduce or prevent emission
natural resource base.
of greenhouse gases.
Uganda’s five-year National Development Plan 2015/16–2019/20 (NPA, 2015) in Mitigation can mean using
the short and medium-term, recognizes that most of the key economic sectors new technologies and
(agriculture, forestry and energy) will be affected by climate change, and as a renewable energies, making
result climate change will negatively affect the national economy. The NDP
older equipment more
therefore emphasizes the need to address challenges of climate change so as to
enhance sustainable economic and social development in the country. energy efficient, or changing
management practices or
1.1 Uganda National Climate Change Policy and consumer behaviour. It can
Wetlands be as complex as a plan for
a new city, or as a simple as
The Uganda’s Climate Change Policy (2015) in line with the 2018 World Wetlands improvements to a cook stove
Day theme, prioritises provision of adequate support for policies and programmes
design.
that take into account interactions between population dynamics, climate change
and development. With regard to wetlands, this Policy has both adaptation and
mitigation sub-priorities (see Boxes 1 and 2).
Under Land Use and Land-Use Change (adaptation), the Policy seeks to promote and enforce urban and rural planning
of settlements; Control and monitor land development and other land-use changes in a sustainable manner so as to
better manage Green House Gas (GHG) sources and sinks. Similarly, the Policy seeks to promote a balance between
conservation and sustainable use of wetlands to reduce GHG emissions.
i. Uganda is endowed with wetland resources that contribute significantly to environmental sustainability,
community livelihoods and carbon sequestration.
ii. However, the country’s wetlands are disappearing at an alarming rate. By end June 2016, Uganda’s land
area covered by wetlands was estimated at 10.9%. The area restored in 2016/17 financial year was only
476 ha hence increasing the coverage of wetlands by 0.002%; this still translates to 10.9% wetlands
coverage.
iii. Major drivers of wetland degradation include draining of wetlands for agriculture, human settlements,
urban and industrial expansion, over-harvesting of wetland resources, over-fishing and poor use of
wetland catchments leading to siltation of wetlands and rivers.
iv. Climate change and intensified land use will exacerbate wetland degradation, as wetlands
will be encroached upon for farming, and incidence of wetland fires is likely to rise.
v. This will increase the rate of interventions needed in this sector to ensure sustainable
wetland conservation and restoration.
Source: Uganda National Climate Change Policy, 2015 & Ministry of Water and Environment, 2017
Under mitigation, the National Climate Change Policy (2015) points out the need to promote and intensify wetland
protection and restoration in order to enhance sinks of greenhouse gases and to promote sustainable use of wetlands as
a response to the sector challenges.
Since the livelihood of the people of Uganda is highly dependent on the exploitation of her natural resources, including
climate Uganda’s priority is adaptation.
Focus will therefore be on reducing vulnerability and addressing adaptation in agriculture and livestock, forestry,
infrastructure (with an emphasis on human settlements, social infrastructure and transport), water, energy, health and
disaster risk management.
In relation to wetlands, Sustainable Land Management and Climate Smart Agriculture will be scaled up to increase
resilience at the grassroots level. Therefore under Uganda’s NDC, wetlands management plays a key part of the planned
climate interventions under both the planned adaptation and mitigation priorities as summarised in Table 1 above.
Photo Source: UCSD
Therefore, there is a need c) There is no action taken on small wetlands by the Ministry of Water and
to equip the responsible Environment that are fast disappearing, like Matte along Hoima Road. Moreover,
institutions with personnel these support livelihoods through direct use functions as well as environmental
and other support to services at community level in urban areas. Loss of these small wetlands especially
regularly monitor these in urban areas is therefore of growing concern.
developments against the
set mitigation plans... d) Oil and gas developments, particularly the routing of the oil pipelines
is likely to affect wetland ecosystem. Therefore, there is a need to equip the
responsible institutions with personnel and other support to regularly monitor
these developments against the set mitigation plans as set out in the Environment
Impact Statements
e) Relatedly, large scale Government infrastructure programmes are not
taking lead in restoring wetlands and other degraded ecosystems due to weak
enforcement of the set mitigation plans and poor management capacities. This
discourages public support for country-wide compliance with related policies and
laws
f) Sand mining in fragile ecosystems like Lake Victoria and adjoining wetlands
like Lwera and many others across the country
j) Lake Wamala has long been identified and proposed as a Ramsar site, but
no follow up is made and yet it is faced with encroachment challenges including
illegal issuance of land titles in the surrounding environs
c) The Ministry of Water and Wetlands should map out all fragile ecosystems
across the country where sand mining is strictly prohibited, and make this publicly
known to all stakeholders including small, medium and large business entities.
d) The Ministry of Water and Environment and other actors should revise,
popularise and fully enforce the sand mining regulations and guidelines in order
to address the current rate of wetlands degradation due to this fast growing
As a starting point, the activity.
Ministry of Water and
Environment should map e) The Ministry of Water and Environment, CSOs and others actors should
and demarcate all urban scale up public awareness and information (including political and local leaders)
wetlands on the benefits of urban wetlands including small wetlands to community
livelihoods.
h) The Ministry of Water and Environment should fast track revision of the
National Wetlands policy as urgently initiate the process to develop a national
wetlands legislation
5.0 Conclusion
The rapidly increasing urban population in Uganda is putting undue stress on key natural resource - dependent
sectors like water supply, agriculture, public health and energy supply in both the urban and rural areas.
Hence, the 2018 World Wetlands Day theme, ‘Wetlands for a Sustainable Urban Future’ is an alarm bell for Uganda
to reflect on governance of its urban wetlands, given their importance to livelihoods, biodiversity conservation, and
to the Country’ climate action plan under the Paris Agreement.
6.0 References
a) The Daily Monitor Newspaper (June 2017). ‘Rapid urbanisation impact Arua wetlands’: http://www.
monitor.co.ug/News/National/Rapid-urbanisation-impact-Arua-wetlands/688334-3979864-11ec4w7/
index.html accessed January 15, 2018
b) Environment and Natural Resources CSOs Position on the Performance of Environment and Natural
Resources subsector in Financial Year 2016/17: http://enr-cso.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/ENRO-
CSO-Insert-2017.pdf accessed January 10, 2018
c) Irish Aid (2015). Uganda Country Climate Action Report. Resilience Policy Team | Irish Aid | November,
2015
d) Ministry of Water and Environment (2015). Uganda National Climate Change Policy.
e) Ministry of Water and Environment (2017). Review of Performance of the Environment and Natural
Resources Sub-sector. Presented to Joint Sector Review (2017) by the Director Environment Affairs:
http://www.mwe.go.ug/sites/default/files/library/MPS%20FY%202017-2018.pdf accessed January 10,
2018
f) Ministry of Water and Environment Policy Statement for the financial year 2017 /2018 (March 2017):
http://www.mwe.go.ug/sites/default/files/library/MPS%20FY%202017-2018.pdf accessed January 10,
2018
g) Uganda Coalition for Sustainable Development (2017). Uganda National Project Baseline Report –
Promoting Implementation of the Paris Agreement (PIPA) in East Africa: http://www.inforse.org/africa/
pdfs/PIPA_Uganda_Baseline_Report_May_8_2017.pdf accessed September 4, 2017
h) Uganda’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC):http://www4.unfccc.int/ndcregistry/
Published Documents/Uganda First/INDC Uganda final 14 October 2015.pdfaccessed September 4, 2017
i) William J. Mitschet. al (2011). Wetlands, carbon, and climate change
(Research article) http://static. springer.com/sgw/documents/1365471/application/pdf/
Wetlands%2C+carbon%2C+and+climate+change. pdf
j) Pauw W.P. et. al, (2017). Beyond headline mitigation numbers: we need more transparent and
comparable NDCs to achieve the Paris Agreement on climate change: https://link.springer.com/
article/10.1007/s10584-017-2122-x#CR23 accessed January 10, 2017
Photo Source: UCSD
Photo Source: UCSD
This Policy Brief has been prepared by the Uganda PIPA project Campaign Group members
(Albertine Rift Conservation Society, Environmental Alert, Hear International, Kikandwa Environment
Association, National Association of Professional Environmentalists, Nature Palace Foundation, Rural
Development and Media Communications) led by UCSD as part of the Project: Promoting Implementation of
the Paris Agreement (PIPA) in East Africa - with a pro-poor focus involving INFORSE Network, SustainableEnergy,
TaTEDO and SusWatch Kenya supported by CISU (Denmark).
Through the PIPA, the above Partners are contributing to strengthening the pro-poor focus and climate change
ambitions in the implementation of the Paris Agreement in East Africa. This is being done through assessing
implementation (readiness) of the NDCs. This is the principal cornerstone of the Paris Agreement. More about
the Project: http://www.inforse.org/africa/East_Africa_PIPA.htm