Biofuel plan: Expect the worst
2008-06-24 11:39
Nairobi - Outraged conservationists on Monday protested Kenyan plans to grow biofuel crops on a coastal wetland, warning the project will ruin the home of 350 species, including endangered ones.
Britain's Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) and Nature Kenya said allowing the planting of sugarcane on more than 20 000 hectares of the Tana River Delta will damage the fragile ecosystem.
Handing over of the delta to state-owned Mumias Sugar Company for sugarcane plantation endangers more than 350 bird species, lions, hippos, nesting turtles and Tana red colobus, one of 25 primates facing extinction worldwide, they said.
The groups commissioned a study in May that concluded there would be "irreversible loss of ecosystem services" if the project goes ahead to establish an estate sugarcane plantation, outgrower system, a sugar factory and 34 megawatt power plant as well as an ethanol production plant.
"We feared this project would turn much of the Delta into an ecological desert and this report shows its impact on local people, on wildlife and on the Kenyan economy would be quite horrific," said Nature Kenya chief Paul Matiku.
"The huge disparity between the scheme's value to Kenya in the future and the worth of what we have now means the government should dismiss these plans immediately."
RSPB African specialist Paul Buckley warned of a "disaster" if the biofuel project fails and the environment suffers at the same time.
"Africa boasts spectacular and invaluable wildlife assets with unquantified benefits for her peoples. Biofuel developments have already caused the widespread destruction of many unique habitats without necessarily cutting greenhouse gas emissions."
Food crisis blamed on biofuel demand
"Loss of the Tana Delta for another unproven biofuel and to a scheme which could well fail, would be a disaster both to hopes of tackling climate change and for those so dependent on the area for their livelihoods," Buckley added.
A Kenya environmentalist agreed, telling AFP: "The move will ruin the environment and given that big companies target profit, then we expect the worst in coming years."
The decision should be reversed and "the most important parts of the Delta made a national protected area so that future development proposals take account of the value of wildlife", the groups added.
Mumias Sugar Company estimates that sugarcane farming in the area, about 120km north of the Indian Ocean city of Mombasa, could raise $37m over two decades.
But the activists' report indicated the value of farming, fisheries, tourism and other incomes derived from land and wildlife is already more than $59m, over the same period.
"The huge disparity between the scheme's value to Kenya in the future and the worth of what we have now means the government should dismiss these plans immediately," Matiku explained.
The activists complained that the company ignored charges of water extraction levied under Kenyan law and the effect of the loss of grazing and crops, leading to overgrazing and eventual land damage.
The rising demand for biofuels, alongside inflation and steep oil prices, has been blamed for the global food crisis that has sparked riots in many poor nations, including Kenya.