Threats come in many forms.  Take the Serengeti/Mara ecosystem for instance.  The threat of a major highway through northern Serengeti is widely publicized.  But a new, possibly more insidious threat comes from an invasive species known as Parthenium.  This is an Australian plant that is invading many areas including the Maasai Mara Game Reserve.  It is fast growing and spreads like a wild fire.  It is poisonous to humans and wildlife and if left unchecked could change the ecosystem dramatically.  We are publishing an article in the next SWARA (Due out in April) on this threat and we invite as many people as possible to read it.

Turning to a different threat altogether, this newsletter highlights some real concerns about the construction of a dam in the South Nandi forest.  Together with Kakamega Forest, they are the most eastern – and in Kenya the only representatives – of the Guinea Congolian forest system.  The Ministry of Regional Development is proposing to construct a fairly intrusive dam right inside the forest reserve, with some significant implications for the forest ecosystem and further downstream on the Yala Swamps ecosystem.

There is local opposition to this proposal, but despite that we can anticipate that the dam implementation will be strongly pushed and we can anticipate that any opposition to the dam will be dismissed as “those environmental NGOs making a song and dance about nothing and sabotaging Kenya’s development”.

Nigel Hunter

Executive Director