Challenges and opportunities posed by a major factor of global change — and creative ways of responding

Online version of a paper by Ted Trzyna published in 2007 by

IUCN (international Union for Conservation of Nature) and the

California Institute of Public Affairs / InterEnvironment

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SECTION 2 OF THE WEB VERSION (WEB PAGE URB-2r)

3.  CASE STUDIES

a.  Introduction

The forms and impacts of urbanization, and responses to them, are best understood in the context of the environments, institutions, economies, and population trends of specific countries and regions. Following are three case studies: of protected areas in Kenya; South Africa; and the Californias, a binational region including parts of Mexico and the USA. Brief notes illustrate special problems and/or innovative solutions from Australia, Brazil, Cape Verde, China, and Kiribati.

I want to emphasize that the case studies do not attempt to give the full stories behind the examples I describe, just enough to put them in context. 

In choosing countries and areas for case studies, I wanted to include (1) places I recently visited where I have had opportunities to see what is happening on the ground and meet face-to-face with local residents, leaders, and experts; (2) a range of biomes, including areas of high biodiversity value; (3) different socioeconomic situations; and (4) places that illustrate different forms and impacts of urbanization, and the conclusions I have drawn from my research.

b.  KENYA

Introduction

Kenya’s current population of 34.7 million is projected to grow to 64.8 million by 2050. Its per capita income is equivalent to U.S. $1,170. About 36% of the population is urban.

Kenya’s three largest cities, Nairobi, Mombasa, and Nakuru, all include important protected areas within their boundaries. This paper focuses on two of these, Nairobi and Lake Nakuru national parks, with notes on a third complex, the Mombasa Marine National Park and Reserve. All are managed by the Kenya Wildlife Service.

Tourism is the second largest contributor to Kenya’s economy, after agriculture. It accounts for 12% of the country’s GDP and 21% of foreign exchange earnings. National parks account for 75% of tourist earnings, which are expected to grow 4.5% to 5% per year (KWS 2005, 16). 

Nairobi National Park

Nairobi National Park was established in 1946 as Kenya’s first national park. It covers 117 sq km.⁵ The park (designated as an IUCN Category II protected area⁶) lies within the city of Nairobi, separated from built-up areas by an electrified fence. It is in the tropical grasslands and savannas biome at an altitude of between 1,540 and 1,780 m. Open grass plains with scattered acacia shrubs are predominant, with part of the area covered by highland dry forest. A river lined by riparian forest runs along the park’s southern boundary, which is unfenced. 

Nairobi is the only city in the world with a major wildlife park next door. The park has an impressive array of species, including black rhinoceros (Diceros bicornis, listed by IUCN as Critically Endangered), lion, leopard, hyena, cheetah, buffalo, eland, wildebeest, zebra, hippopotamus, giraffe, and diverse birdlife. However, the populations of most of these species are much smaller than in the late 1970s, perhaps down as much as 75% overall.

The park has had about 100,000 visitors a year since the 1950s. In addition, a Safari Walk and Wildlife Conservation Education Centre at the main entrance receive many visits from students, teachers, and the general public. 

The main threat to Nairobi National Park from urbanization is urban sprawl. Pollution and human-wildlife conflicts are also significant. 

According to census figures, the population within the city’s municipal boundaries grew from 119,000 in 1948 to 2.14 million in 1999. Today, the number of people in the metropolitan area is estimated at between 3-4 million.

Heavy industry, as well as residential and commercial development, extends right up to the park fence. Along the park’s northeastern boundary there are tanneries, a steel works, a cement plant, and a chemical factory that dumps industrial waste into a river and discharges toxic pollutants into the air.  

South of the park is another kind of problem related to urbanization. An extensive area vital for animal migration and dispersal is gradually being subdivided and fenced into small parcels. Country estates and shantytowns have arisen as both rich and poor want to escape urban congestion. There are sheep and goat farms. Eucalyptus groves have been planted (the wood is grown for power poles and fence posts). Plastic greenhouses have been erected for flower production (Kenya has become Europe’s major supplier of fresh-cut flowers). All these uses depend on wells for their water supply and are gradually drawing down the aquifer, which affects indigenous plant life and watering holes for wildlife within and outside the park.

Large herbivores moving through this migration route are followed by lion and other predators that also attack livestock. Although there is a program to compensate owners of livestock killed by wild predators, some owners have taken direct action. In 2004, 11 of Nairobi National Park’s 18 lions were found dead from poisoning; however, the lion population had recovered by 2006. There have been many similar incidents in the past (Frank et al. 2006).  

Kenya has a sound legal framework for land-use planning and regulation, at least on paper, but geographer R.A. Obudho (1997), who has written extensively on Nairobi, points out that the process is ”fraught with corruption” and regulations are ignored. Although the city has “extensive development control powers . . . these have not been effectively enforced.” Recent discussions with conservationists in Nairobi confirm this.

Kenya ranks high, 142 on a scale of 163, on the most recent Corruption Perceptions Index compiled by Transparency International, the global anti-corruption NGO. Its national affiliate, Transparency International Kenya, publishes its own annual Kenya Bribery Index (TI 2006). In recent years, corruption has become a major political issue in Kenya, getting prominent attention in the country’s press.

Responding to this concern, President Mwai Kibaki announced in September 2006 the establishment of an autonomous Nairobi Metropolitan Region Development Board “for the proper planning and administration of the city of Nairobi.” Among the board’s responsibilities will be coordinating planning and environmental management and “enforcing compliance” (KBC 2006).

The Kenya Wildlife Service is taking a proactive stance in working to control land development within the larger ecosystem in which Nairobi National Park is embedded.  Its main tool is public awareness. Nationally, KWS is giving higher priority to education and established a new education department in 2005 that has seven regional offices.

In the area surrounding Nairobi National Park, KWS also collaborates with other agencies such as the Ministry of Lands, which is formulating a master plan for the area. In addition, KWS is involved in programs that encourage landowners south of the park to keep animal migration and dispersal routes open; this requires much patience and confidence-building.    

There is definitely a positive side to having a national park within the boundaries of an important city. Nairobi is not only the capital of Kenya but the most populous urban center in East Africa and a regional business and media center. It also has the largest concentration of diplomats in sub-Saharan Africa, due to the presence of a number of international organizations, including the world headquarters of both the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (known as UN-HABITAT).

For these diplomats and international officials it is easy to go out to the park in the late afternoon for a “game drive.” In so doing, they learn about the natural environment, and many of them join or contribute money to the Friends of Nairobi National Park or other conservation NGOs.

Lake Nakuru National Park

Lake Nakuru National Park (IUCN Category II) is renowned for its huge numbers of lesser flamingo (Phoeniconaias minor), as many as 1.5 million at a time, covering the shores of Lake Nakuru in solid pink. The park is in the tropical grasslands and savannas biome and lies 140 km northwest of Nairobi at an elevation of around 1,800 m. First established as a bird sanctuary in 1960, it became a national park in 1968 and was later expanded to its present size of 188 sq km. The lake is on the Ramsar List of Wetlands of International Importance under the Convention on Wetlands (Ramsar 2006). It is the only Kenya national park that is entirely fenced in.  

Lake Nakuru has no outlet. It sits at the lowest point of a watershed of 1,800 sq km, fed by the Njoro, Makalia, and Enderit rivers, as well as rainfall and springs along its shoreline. The lake’s inflow is balanced by evaporation.

The lake is shallow. Although it potentially has a surface of 62 sq km, its depth has been quite variable due to poorly understood interactions among hydrology, meteorology, and geology. Periodically, it dries up entirely, most recently in the late 1950s. Lake Nakuru is one of a series of shallow alkaline lakes in the Eastern Rift Valley whose food chains are based on populations of algae and fish that can survive under only very specific conditions. Any changes in water level or composition have drastic impacts on their ecosystems (KWS 2003, 27). 

In addition to flamingo, the park has many other species of birds and mammals, including hippopotamus, zebra, buffalo, white rhinoceros, and Rothschild’s giraffe. The park area surrounding the lake includes patches of marsh and grassland alternating with rocky hills, stretches of acacia woodland, and what is claimed to be the largest euphorbia forest in Africa (of the candelabra tree, Euphorbia ingens, which here reaches a height of 15 m). The park receives about 300,000 visitors a year, of whom half are Kenyan, including 100,000 students.

The main threats to the park from urbanization relate to reduced water quantity and quality. The level of water in the lake has drastically receded in recent years, perhaps due to a combination of natural and human causes, and it has become a sump for silt and waste. However, these problems have rural, as well as urban, sources.

The park lies within the municipality of Nakuru, a governmental and agricultural center that serves a large area of the Rift Valley. According to census figures, the population within the city’s boundaries grew from 47,000 in 1969 to 219,000 in 1999. Current estimates for the metropolitan area range up to 500,000, with an annual increase of around 10%.

The lake receives treated water from the sewage works of Nakuru, as well as raw sewage from houses unconnected to the sewer system. Although most larger factories have their own waste treatment systems, many smaller facilities such as car-repair shops and textile-dying plants dump industrial wastes into pits that drain into ground water. The largest single source of pollution in Lake Nakuru is urban runoff from the first major rains of two wet seasons, the so-called “first flush.” This runoff includes oil, grease, and toxic chemicals from motor vehicles; viruses and bacteria from leaking septic tanks; sediments from new construction; and plastic bags.

Urban pollution is exacerbated by sediment and agricultural chemicals flowing into the rivers from outlying areas of the watershed. Kenyan conservationist Ramesh J. Thampy writes that during the 20th century Lake Nakuru’s watershed was “transformed from a sparsely settled and heavily forested area teeming with wildlife to one that is heavily settled, extensively cultivated, and urbanized.” Although destruction of habitat and wildlife started with European farmers and ranchers in the first half of the century, government resettlement schemes initiated shortly after independence in 1963 resulted in a surge in human population and replacement of natural vegetation by small-scale subsistence farms. Rains on exposed soils have resulted in Lake Nakuru receiving greatly increased sediment and nutrient loads. “The depletion of natural ground cover is also thought to have altered the hydrological regime” of the watershed and “resulted in diminished surface flow into Lake Nakuru.” In addition, deforestation and climate change have resulted in less rainfall (Thampy 1996).

Forests continue to be converted to small-scale agriculture. As recently as 1970, nearly half the watershed was forested; now it is less than 15%. A recent study of the part of the watershed drained by the Njoro River found that between 2000 and 2005 the number of cattle rose by over 250%, and the number of sheep rose by about 200% (SUMAWA 2005).

In 2005-2006, more than 30,000 lesser flamingo have been found dead at Lake Nakuru. Similar mass die-offs occurred there in 1993, 1995, and 1997, and have also occurred at other Rift Valley lakes. Since 2004, the species has been classified as Near Threatened by IUCN (2006c), because it depends on a small number of unprotected breeding sites. In September 2006, thousands of lesser flamingo appeared for the first time at small Lake Oloiden, southeast of Lake Nakuru. The causes of the deaths and unusual migration are unclear, although changes in lake ecology due to pollution and alien flora and fauna are suspected.

In October 2006, two dozen flamingo experts from around the world came together in Nairobi to discuss an action plan to protect the lesser flamingo. Their recommendations are being submitted to the African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbird Agreement (AEWA 2006), the largest such agreement concluded under the framework Convention on Migratory Species of Wild Animals (Koenig 2006).          

The plight of Lake Nakuru is receiving much attention from Kenyan and international conservation organizations and development agencies. So far, efforts have concentrated on monitoring, research, and strategizing. Numerous conservation measures have been put forward, but implementation has been slow (Ramsar 2005).  Proposed solutions include restoring ground cover in the watershed, reforming soil management practices, cutting back on use of agrichemicals, and improving the handling of urban waste. These are daunting tasks, particularly upstream, where in some rural areas average earnings are less than the equivalent of U.S. $1 a day. Efforts to evict squatters from protected forest land have been opposed by human-rights groups and some elected officials.

The Kenya Wildlife Service is working with municipal officials on a strategic plan for Nakuru and to improve water supply and sewage connections. It is encouraging the Kenya Forest Department to protect watershed lands under its authority, but that department has very limited resources. KWS is also trying to raise public awareness locally of the importance of the national park, especially among political and business leaders and schoolchildren. It has helped organize a local business association, works with a citizens’ group called Friends of Lake Nakuru, and supports neighborhood associations that plant trees and sponsor clean-up events. At the park’s main gate, adjoining the urbanized area of Nakuru, an education center and a strip of lawn are open without payment of an entrance fee, and two buses take city residents on free visits to the lake itself. Local leaders are invited to special events in the national park. For example, in September 2006, a “Cycle with Rhinos” bicycle race was followed by a picnic, awards, and speeches by civic leaders and a Member of Parliament.

However, the contrasts between the city and the national park are striking. Commercial buildings and public housing line the park fence. Within the crowded urban area there is little green space; the only city park, Nyayo Gardens, across from a leading tourist hotel, is a haven for drug addicts. The air is full of diesel exhaust and smoke from charcoal cooking fires. And Nakuru continues to grow. 

If Lake Nakuru continues its decline, the flamingos may go elsewhere. If they do, tourism in Nakuru will die, and so will the numerous businesses and jobs that depend on it.

One possible solution is for the national government to create a regional development board for the Nakuru region such as the one it is setting up for Nairobi. That board would not only have authority to oversee environmental management and enforce compliance with laws, but could put unemployed people to work on environmental improvement projects. Another, more radical, solution would be for KWS itself to take over management of the Lake Nakuru watershed. A national Environmental Management and Coordination Act, drafted in collaboration with the United Nations Environment Programme and enacted in 1999, provides a legal and institutional framework for much stronger action to protect the country’s natural resources (UNEP 1999).

A fundamental cause of the problems faced by both Nairobi and Lake Nakuru national parks is rural-to-urban migration. Reversing this flow depends on wealth creation in rural areas. A number of projects sponsored or endorsed by the Kenyan government are working to do this. An example is the Village Transformation Scheme, centered on reforestation (Tuller 2006).

Mombasa Marine National Park and Reserve

Off Mombasa, Kenya’s main coastal city, the park (IUCN Category II) covers 10 sq km and the reserve (IUCN Category VI) another 200 sq km of the Indian Ocean, protecting the beach, a lagoon, an extensive coral reef, and open sea. Since these areas were established in 1988, enforcement by KWS has reduced over-fishing and coral trampling, so much so that surveys conducted 10 years later found major increases in fish size, abundance, and diversity; coral cover; and nesting by sea turtles (Bryant et al. 1998). The commercial fishing industry has been very supportive. However, KWS has less control over pollution from the city and the numerous resort hotels that line the beaches up and down the coast. These establishments cater mainly to cost-conscious package tourists from Europe, many of whom never venture to the country’s great wildlife parks in the interior. To stay competitive, some hotels cut their costs by dumping waste into the sea, waiting for darkness and a receding high tide to do so. KWS is aware of this and intends to enforce the law.

Web sites

East Africa Wildlife Society: http://www.eawildlife.org

Kenya Wildlife Service: http://www.kws.org (includes links to pages on all

  national parks)

Lakes of the Rift Valley Project: http://www.kenya-rift-lakes.org