EAC ll - Lake Victoria

EAC Part Two - Lake Victoria


With three of the six Nile Basin EAC member states bordering Lake Victoria (Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda), disputes around the shared water source is high. As one of the large sources of water to the White Nile, Lake Victoria is subject to political contestation and this blog post will explore how the resource availability in each bordering country adds to the internal pressure of access to and sovereignty of the lake.




If a country is resource scarce, it does not necessarily mean that conflict is inevitable- it may however, spark social dissatisfaction and could potentially lead to political mobilisation or international disputes. This has been the case with all three countries sharing direct access to Lake Victoria. The collective future pressures from a variety of factors including population pressure, agricultural expansion or hydroelectric power on the Nile is unknown (Sida, 2004). There is however, evidence stating that the population of the Nile River Basin is set to increase in all countries from the current population size of approximately 500 million (Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas, 2017). This increase in population pressure can be seen in the following maps:
       
   
Not only do population growth rates increase drastically in all three countries bordering Lake Victoria, but the rates are amongst the highest in the entire Nile River Basin, witht Uganda experiencing the most rapid growth.


In Kenya, only 8.5% of the total land area is covered by Lake Victoria yet it makes up 50% of the country’s freshwater resource (FAO, 1997). This huge reliance on the supply of freshwater puts immense pressure on the water source (Nile Basin Water Resources Atlas, 2016) and surrounding land. With one of the most diverging populations in terms of income, Kenya has huge social and cultural differences within its national borders. The central, rather affluent region has a significantly higher access to health and education infrastructure (Sida, 2004), decreasing their dependence on agriculture for income. The northern regions bordering Lake Victoria on the other hand are amongst the poorest regions in Africa, heavily reliant on subsistence agricultural practices and therefore survive on the access to the waters for domestic and agricultural use. This region also has  the highest rates of HIV/AIDS in the country, contributing to the poverty. The Nyanza province surrounding the Lake has seen huge developments in tea and sugar cane production (Sida, 2004), which make up approximately 50% of export earnings. Due to the high importance on these water intensive cash crops for the local economy, production has been expanded, further increasing the strain on the land in addition to a growing population, exacerbating food insecurity and water available for domestic use.
The Mwanza, Mara and Kagera regions in Tanzania are all directly reliant on Lake Victoria as a source for subsistence agriculture, mining and manufacturing. The Mwanza region in Tanzania has both the highest population as well as largest population density in the country, closely followed by the other two regions bordering the Lake (Sida, 2004). Relations remain unstable not only between the regions but also across the national border between the Kenyan and Tanzanian pastoralists. A conflict of interest between farmers and environmental conservationists protecting the Serengeti national park has also cultivated a constant tension between the areas. Colonial borders between Tanzania and Uganda split the kingdom of Kitara in Bunyoro for example, exacerbating the existing disputes over water access and farming rights even in recent years. It is imperative to look at the regional relations in a historical context to understand modern disputes.
Similarly to Kenya, Uganda’s primary crops from agricultural production were coffee, tea and towards the Kenyan border, cotton. Over the past two decades production has shifted more towards cocoa, vanilla and pepper (Okoth, 2007), but the reliance on cash crops remains the dominant economic income. The main industrial and manufacturing businesses are located towards the North of the country, at greater distance from Lake Victoria but are heavily reliant on constant supply form the Lake, creating tension between the regions. Criminal activity is also common in the cities like Masaka and Kampala due to high youth unemployment and economic instability, in extreme situations leading to terrorist outbursts in Kampala City for example (Ogello, 2013). The shared water source has therefore been sparked competition and questions of sovereignty that in turn lead to greater social consequences, threatening national and  international security.

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