The Nile River is the longest in the world, at 6,650 km long and encompassing an area of 3,349,000 square kilometres. Its basin is shared by eleven countries: Burundi, DRC, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Egypt, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya, Sudan, South Sudan and Tanzania.
The Nile River is an essential life force for over 200 million people spread across its basin countries. As a shared water resources, celebrating this majestic river must demonstrate the urgency to preserve and protect the Nile against man-made disasters aggravated by climate change.
Currently, the Nile is unable to cope with shared water demands. Effects of climate change such as unpredictable river flow and precipitation are adding to human-induced land degradation, deforestation, water pollution and the construction of hydro-power dams in Ethiopia, Sudan and Uganda. All these challenges combined are aggravating the water crisis throughout the region.
All the basin countries including East Africa, are susceptible to famine, droughts and prolonged El Niño effects and reversed La Niña. Droughts and recurring food crisis experienced in the Horn of Africa make water a precious and scarce resource, reminding us of our common responsibility to protect the Nile River, which has provided life to people in the Nile basin for thousands of years.
2019, like the last few years, promises increased dramatic weather patterns affecting water availability. Droughts and floods caused by climate change are no longer a threat but a clear and present danger.
In order to mitigate the vulnerability of climate impacts such as water and food scarcity, land degradation, deforestation, human settlements and biodiversity losses, East African Community Partner States must take a stronger leadership for greater and concrete climate leadership and action through the acceleration of the 100% renewable energy funding and the stopping of construction of mega devastating hydro-power dams; and to embrace Paris Agreement provisions in the EAC Climate Change Policy & Proposed Climate Law.