The public has proposed the incorporation of a human rights based approach in environmental management as stipulated in the Sand Harvesting Act 2016 currently being amended and the regulations under formulation.
Speaking during a public participation forum held on Monday at Mwatate by the technical committee on Sand Harvesting, Conservation and Utilization, they called for Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA), a participatory approach that takes into consideration both the economic and social aspects.
“The adoption of the commonly reffered to as Strategic Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (SESIA) will ensure transparency and accountability in the extraction industry in the County and that the community component is equitably accounted for,” said Ms. Beatrice Mjomba.
They further called for intensive sensitization of the community on protecting the environment thus translation of the Bill to Swahili before it is distributed at the Ward level for wananchi to familiarize themselves with the Act once it’s assented to.
Dr. Marianna Maghenda of Taita Taveta University advised the County Government to enrol a few officers for the GeoInformatics course being offered at the institution.
The officers can be involved in mapping out zones and designated access roads to natural resources.
“We have a modern geo Informatics program. We are training GIS experts for ten days. Mapping our resources will help us monitor, manage and protect our resources and above all we will be able to scale up environmental management,” said Dr. Maghenda.
The stakeholders also observed that the sand harvesting blue print should incorporate point of sale terminals to monitor sand transportation and specifically spell out the activities to be carried out during rehabilitation of the environment to seal all loopholes and hold harvesters accountable.
The technical committee will incorporate the views of the public before the amendments are forwarded to the Executive for perusal and later on tabled before the County Assembly. The public can still forward their proposals on amendments to the Sand Harvesting Act 2016, in form of memorandum to the County Government.
Earlier, a delegation led by Hon. Daniel Makoko, the CECM Education and Libraries have held a sensitization meeting at Mlambenyi VTC.
Addressing residents of Mwatate Ward, the CECM said that training of students was going to commence in January 2019. He promised to fast track the registration of the institution by ensuring that more instructors were deployed.
The Principal Manager had already been deployed hence interested residents should register their names and courses so as to inform the area of specialization of instructors to be deployed. The facility was completed in June 2017 but training had not started yet.
The area MCA Hon. Abednego Mwanjala reiterated that the commencement of training will help residents train on different technical areas.
Hon. Ambassador Anastanzia Wakesho Mombo urged the residents to make good use of the facility.
She added that Governor Granton Samboja had gotten it right by appointing an educationist in the position of CECM Education and Libraries as he is well versed in education matters.
Taita–Taveta County is a county of Kenya. It lies approximately 150 km northwest of Mombasa and 300 km southeast of Nairobi.
The capital is Mwatate, although it is the fourth largest town in the county after Voi, Wundanyi and Taveta in that order.
The population of the county 30 years ago was approximately 45,000 persons but this has shot up to well over 250,000 persons with population densities ranging from 3 persons per km2. to more than 800 persons per km2.
This is due to the varied rainfall and terrain with the lower zones receiving an average 440 mm of rain per annum and the highland areas receiving up to 1900 mm of rain. The district ranges in altitude from 500 m above sea level to 2,228 m at Vuria Peak, which is the district’s highest point.
In 2007, the Taita–Taveta District was split into two districts: the Taita District and the Taveta District. The two were subsequently re-united to form Taita–Taveta County.
The county covers an area of 17,083.9 km2. of which a bulk 62% or 11,100 km2. is within Tsavo East and Tsavo West National Parks. The remaining 5,876 km2 is occupied by ranches, sisal estates, water bodies such as Lakes Chala and Jipe in Taveta and Mzima springs, and the hilltop forests which occupy less than 100 km2. or approximately 10 km2 out of 587.5 km2.
The lowland areas of the district that do not belong to national parks are divided among ranches, estates, and wildlife sanctuaries. The district has approximately 25 ranches. The main land use in ranch is cattle grazing. The three operating sisal estates of the district are the Teita Sisal Estate, Voi Sisal Estate and Taveta Sisal Estate. Many ranches utilize also wildlife tourism and conservation. The Taita Hills and Saltlick Lodges sanctuary is located in the district.
There are 48 forests which have survived on hill tops in the district of which 28 are gazetted and are under government protection and management. They range in size from small 500 square metres with a few remnant trees to modestly vast 2 square kilometres indigenous and exotic forest mountains. These forests are part of a unique Eastern Arch range of forests which are found mostly in Eastern Tanzania with the Taita Hills forming the only Kenyan Eastern Arc forest type in East Africa.
The Taita Hills forest hold a unique biodiversity with 13 taxa of plants and 9 taxa of animals found only in the Taita Hills and nowhere else in the world. In addition 22 plant species found in the Taita Hills forests are typical of the Eastern arc forests. The next being in eastern Tanzania. Some of the endemic African violet – Saintpaulia teitensis among others. Within these beautiful indigenous forests, bubble pure clean water to the lowland areas to cater for both human agricultural activities and wildlife in the Taita game sanctuary and Aruba dam in Tsavo East. The lower plains are thus supplied with water by the forests in the hills which are a good catchment of rains