An environmentally sensitive wetland, a multi-national company and a local community that feels sidelined. Sound familiar? Patrick Ochieng introduces the Yala Swamp region in Kenya and asks if Foreign Direct Investment is really the answer to Africa's development problems.

Yala Swamp is a wetland bounded to the north by Nzoia River and the south by Yala River. The swampland covers an area of about 17,500 ha in Siaya, Bondo and Busia districts that are home to nearly 1.2 million people. The area is Kenya's largest wetland, and is regarded as a very delicate ecosystem and habitat to some rare flora and fauna, including endangered fish species. The swamp has served the adjacent communities as a source of fish, water, agricultural land, pastures, wild animals, plants for constructing houses, source of wood fuel and medicinal plants.

Dominion Farms Ltd, an affiliate of the USA-based Dominion Group, based in Oklahoma, USA moved into the swamp through an arrangement with the Lake Basin Development Authority (LBDA). Dominion Group controls investments across the globe. The company operates luxury corporate hotels, is involved in modification of corporate aircrafts, ownership and operation of corporate aircraft, construction of houses and offices to be leased by the US government, manufacture of athletic dress and socks, correctional services and other businesses spanning several countries.

The initial proposal was that Dominion would engage in rice production, in part of the swamp covering about 2,300 ha. This land portion had been reclaimed before 1970, and previously used by LBDA for agricultural activity. Dominion embarked on large-scale agricultural activities in the swamp following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding with the Councils of Siaya and Bondo in May 2003.

Although rice for which the lease was executed has not been planted, the firm has engaged in activities beyond agriculture, which include construction of irrigation dykes and weirs, water drilling, construction of an airstrip and road construction. Dominion has further proposed to undertake a number of new development projects within the Yala Swamp. For this purpose it is proposing that part of 9,200 ha will be reclaimed from swamp area to meet the needs of new projects. This would leave only 6,000 ha (35%) of current wetland to act as buffer zone.

The proposed project is extensive and specifically seeks to: Implement a highly mechanized irrigation and dry farming project; Construct fishponds for aquaculture; Construct a fish processing plant to process about 20 tons of fish per day, mainly for export; and Construct a rice mill, feed mill, ginnery, fuel storage, dispensing station, turbine for electricity production, barrier dyke, weir and reservoir.

The proposed projects fall under those that must undertake an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) under Kenyan law. The EIA report submitted by Dominion consultants has concluded that:

- The project will bring into productive use a high potential resource that has been underutilized and which has cost the government and the people of Kenya huge amounts of money with little appreciable returns;
- The proposed project will create employment both directly and indirectly to thousands of people through primary and secondary activities;
- The project will make a positive impact to increased incomes and access to basis needs;
- The project will act as growth pole around which other commercial activities will gravitate;
- The local communities support the proposed project, which they perceive as a boost to the development of the region;
- The local communities are enthusiastic about the project.

But the EIA did not deal with the impact of the project on the soils, water quality, vegetation and wildlife. It did not deal conclusively with environmental, ecological, socio-economic and management issues related to the situation of the swamp. The impacts of the project on water, vegetation, habitat and human activity were also not addressed. The community feels that they have not been properly consulted, and while communities were requested to form groups so that individuals did not dominate the process, this has not happened.

The consultants who carried out the EIA were employees of LBDA and thus were compromised by issues of conflict of interest. The sticky issue of compensation for families displaced by the project has refused to go away. Existing fish processing plants and a fishmeal plant in the area are operating below their capacity, raising the question of why it is necessary to build further plants.

The EIA report has aimed to justify the project on the basis of its economic importance, components, design, choice of location, implementation strategy and mitigation measures put in place. The report has, however, recognized that the proposed projects pose a number of negative impacts at various stages of implementation. This list is long, some of them with very serious consequences. They include: Flooding and altered water flow patterns; Contamination of soil and water by oil leakages and spillage; Pollution of River Yala by solid and liquid wastes from project activities; Possibility of respiratory ailments due to inhalation of dust and fumes from construction equipment; Loss of grazing land for the local community; Incidences of water-borne and vector-borne diseases; Displacement of local communities; Displacement of fauna and loss of flora; Reduced production of subsistence crops leading to food deficits in the region; and the introduction of foreign crops and genetically modified crops that may introduce new pests into the area.

At a meeting convened on November 8, 2005, we asked members of the affected communities to identify the problems the project posed for them. Problems faced by the communities included denial of access to water and land; denial of fishing rights; blocking of direct routes between communities for purposes of trading, wage reductions and threats of flooding due to dyke construction.

The community members felt that the project should be halted so that proper consultation could take place to iron out issues that were not attended to. These would include the issuance of title deeds to people whose land had been surveyed, construction on land that was earmarked only and open discussions with the local administration, the firm, the LBDA and the community. Despite these concerns the members of parliament from the region have turned a deaf ear to the people's pleas.

There is therefore urgent need to undertake and examine, from accounts, opinions and experiences of the different stakeholders, the socio-economic dimensions of proposed activities. Such an independent study would inform the advocacy processes being carried out by Friends of Yala Swamp, a group of CSOs who have come together to oppose the Dominion project by providing the factual data that can help raise the stakes in negotiations with the company, and also to sharpen awareness and inform Kenya's future engagements with foreign direct investments. The study would actually contribute to research that will facilitate a planned court injunction to stop Dominion activities until the issues raised are addressed.

The Yala Swamp issue is about broader concerns related to government economic policy. Successive governments in Kenya have always expressed commitment to eradicate poverty in all its forms. The latest anti-poverty rhetoric is NARC's framework “economic recovery for wealth creation and employment,” whose central feature is anchored on the belief that foreign exchange and foreign direct investment is the solution to Kenya's development woes. Therefore, as a country we have set out to woo foreign investors. This, notwithstanding the fact that private operators and mega projects owe no accountability to the public and concern themselves principally with cost recovery and profit before anything else.

These export-led growth strategies subordinate human needs and human rights to corporate greed and corporate profit. Big business can never be part of a progressive and sustainable earth. Despotism and corruption has been at the core of Kenya's engagement with foreign investors. Compromised political elites who are often tempted to act as stewards of imperialist interests have continued to give away mineral exploration rights, fisheries, forests and forest products, biological resources and coastal biodiversity to multinationals. The Dominion Group ventures fall into this category and there are doubts as to the extent its activities will enhance food security, increase crop and fish production for domestic consumption and reduce poverty.

Organized resistance to these government policies is mounting as has been seen in the case of Canadian company Tiomin's bid to mine titanium in the coast of Kenya that has not proceeded for over 10 years now; the boycott of Delmonte products that saw reforms to working practices in the firm's pineapple fields in Kenya; the advocacy against flower farms in Naivasha on unethical work practices and use of dangerous chemicals by human rights organizations in Kenya and now the Dominion advocacy that so far is grossly underestimated but which in the fullness of time will prove extremely potent and fierce.

* Patrick Ochieng is the founder and Executive Director of Ujamaa Center, a Center founded in 2001 as a direct response to the continuing exploitation and exclusion of coastal peoples of Kenya that spans over 40 years. Ujamaa is a key member of the Friends of Yala Swamp, a loose coalition of social justice institutions, advocates, and members of the affected communities who have come together to resist the injustices visited on this ecosystem and its people.

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