BIODIVERSITY AND CLIMATE CHANGE The Case of Walvis Bay

1. INTRODUCTION 1.1. Walvis Bay Historical/Political Background Walvis Bay, meaning “Whale Bay” in Afrikaans, has had a chequered history. In fact, the Topnaars were the first settlers within Walvis Bay since the early Stone Age.

The Topnaars belong to the Nama group of people. For centuries the Topnaars have lived off the oasis created by the Kuiseb River and Delta. Without doubt, the Topnaars are among the oldest inhabitants of Namibia. They trace their origins back before 1652, when Jan van Riebeeck established a European settlement on the Southern African soil. Records from 1677 recount a barter trade system between Topnaars and European sailors, which suggest that the Topnaars were among the first traders in Namibia. Beef, lamb, milk, !Nara plants and fresh water were exchanged for groceries, clothes and weapons.

The bulk of their subsistence activities is the recovery of !Nara seeds and some goat herding. The ground water abstraction and the lowering of the water table indirectly affect these activities. The Topnaar community is also expanding into tourism development in the Namib Naukluft Park and the recently proclaimed Dorob National Park, which spills over to the Walvis Bay area.

Although Walvis Bay had already been discovered by Diaz, a Portuguese explorer as early as 1487, it was only founded in 1793 by the Cape Dutch. Two years later it was annexed by the British. In 1910, Walvis Bay became - like the entire Cape Colony of the present day South Africa - part of the South African Union. Walvis Bay, the only deep sea harbour on the Namibian coast, remained under South African rule after Namibia's independence and only in 1994 did the former South African president F.W. de Klerk agree to return the former enclave to Namibia.

1.2. Walvis Bay Ecosystems The desert meets the sea at Walvis Bay. The municipal area is approximately 1,124 km2 in size and is situated on the south western coast of Africa and flanked by 60 kilometres of the cold, nutrient rich South Atlantic Ocean’s coastline. It lies between the Swakop River in the north and the Namib Desert’s sand dunes and gravel plains to the east with its boundary extending to the Namib Naukluft Park. To the south are the 12 600 hectare Walvis Bay wetlands, with the WB wetlands listed as a Ramsar Site in 1995, and the adjoining delta of the ephemeral Kuiseb River in the south.

Walvis Bay is situated in the most arid part of the hyper-arid Namib Desert having high coastal sand dunes and a coastal climate that is strongly moderated by the cold-water upwelling of the Benguela system. The area is characterised by mild summers and cool winters and fog is a regular feature throughout the year. Long-term mean annual rainfall is less than 20 mm, while totals may range from 0 to over 100 mm per year. Wind is the single most important physical

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agent in the area affecting wave action, transport of sediments onto the shoreline and then further inland, and the shape and movement of surrounding sand dunes. The winds are characterised by high velocity, high frequency south to south-westerly winds in summer and high velocity, low frequency east to north-westerly winds in winter.

Walvis Bay is thus blessed with rich ecosystems and biodiversity which form the basis of our development therefore the preservation thereof is critical to the sustainable growth of all the sectors and the entire economy of Walvis Bay. It is for these reasons that the city’s ecosystem is divided into four main areas [(1) The Walvis Bay Ramsar Site; (2) The Kuiseb Delta; (3) The Dune Belt Area and (4) The Walvis Bay Coastline]. The characteristics of each zone are easily identifiable by its location and extent of the area or zone; its ecological description; the socio- economic issues, and the associated environmental threats and management tools. This zonation will help all stakeholders to place a stronger footing in the respective institutions and secure support for its environmental planning and management strategies.

1.3. Environmental Management in the City of Walvis Bay The management of the environment by the city council of Walvis Bay is inspired by the Constitution of the Republic of Namibia, whereby Namibia commits itself to sustainable development through environmental protection and wise resource management.

Article 95 (1), Promotion of the Welfare of the People, puts forward this intention as follows: The State shall actively promote and maintain the welfare of the people by adopting… policies aimed at: (1) Maintenance of ecosystems, essential ecological processes and biological diversity of Namibia and utilization of living natural resources on a sustainable basis for the benefit of all Namibians, both present and future…

In accordance with the Constitution, the national government has established a Ministry of Environment and Tourism (MET) and formulated a number of policies and legislation directed at managing the environment. In addition to national legislation, policies, programmes and plans, Namibia has signed many international treaties and conventions aiming at protecting the global environment. The following (and the ratification date) are particularly important for the management of climate change and the Walvis Bay Biodiversity:

 The Convention on Wetlands of International Importance (Ramsar Convention) -23 December 1995.  International Convention on Prevention of Pollution from ships (MARPOL Protocol) –  The Convention on Biological Diversity – 18 March 1997  The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification – 21 October 1994  The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change- 12 June 1992

The Municipality of Walvis Bay (WBM) and its Council were established under the provisions of the Local Authorities Act No. 23 of 1992 delegating power from the national level to local authorities to administer municipal areas only without any specific environmental management mandate and or direct ministerial support. However, municipal by-laws and policies with regard to housing, environmental health, town planning, public participation and littering, amongst others, are all important for environmental management purposes. Hence the WBM initiated stakeholders’ participation in all environmental related initiatives in order to ensures the

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prosperity of Walvis Bay’s people and reducing what are high levels of poverty depends strongly on good management of the environmental assets of the city and its surrounding biodiversity. It is thus not a surprise that the Municipality of Walvis Bay is one of the only two Namibian local authorities (out of approximately 50 local authorities) that has a dedicated established environmental section within it organizational structure. The Environmental Section of the WBM has been designated as the local agency responsible for the coordination and implementation of environmental matters, and this was partly achieved through the establishment of various project steering committees (WB LA 21 PSC, CAAP PSC & WB LAB PSC) which were formed during various specific projects and time spans since 2001. Official agendas and minutes were produced during all these Project Steering Committee (PSC) meetings.

The city council of Walvis Bay made four main strategic decisions with regard to climate change and biodiversity management, namely:

A. To have a Strategic Policy Direction on both biodiversity and climate change – This was achieved through the process of revising the Councils’ Integrated Environmental Policy (WB IEP). Initially Council adopted a HSE Policy in 1995.This was only a statement of commitment with much emphasis on health and safety. A proper, more intense and community involved process was embarked upon in drafting the WB IEP during 2002. Council resolved to adopt this WB IEP for the period 2002 – 2008 and the then Mayor signed this Policy as a pledge of political support towards the implementation of this Policy. This Policy however did not recognize the importance of biodiversity conservation and climate change mitigation of adaptation. This was rectified when Council, in March 2008, resolved to adopt a revised WB IEP that recognize the importance of climate change and biodiversity management. This Policy covers the period between 2008 – 2015 when it will be revised and putting emphasis on tools such as the TEEB Report, Leaders for Climate Change, the Mayors’ Handbook, Local Government Climate Risk Tool, Climate Reports, and the Walvis Bay Adaptation Framework.

B. To form Strategic Partnership – with institutions and or organizations that can render expert advice, know-how, physical means and or financial resources toward climate change mitigation/adaptation and biodiversity management. Council resolved in November 2009 to enter in partnership with ICLEI and UN-Habitat on climate change initiatives as well as with the Namibian Ministry of Regional & Local Government, Housing and Rural Development (MRLGHRD) on urban sector profiling, which initiatives are ongoing to date. The WBM participated and contributed to a number of various local, national, continental and international meetings and workshop, which has equally resulted in a number of various draft assessment and guiding documentation. These documents now need to be finalized in order to be valuable to the city of Walvis Bay.

C. To Strategically Coordinate environmental and climate change activities in Walvis Bay – Environmental management in Walvis Bay is done either in isolation, sometime in conflict to other initiatives and without the knowledge of some main stakeholders. The WBM is strongly committed to working both in a cross-sectoral fashion within the municipality, and in partnership with the town´s citizens, interest groups and institutions (i.e. churches, sports and social clubs, schools, old age homes, voluntary organisations and industry associations, amongst many others). To “promote teamwork and stakeholder involvement”, the Walvis Bay Environmental Management and Advisory Forum (WEMAF) was established recently

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with it 1st meeting held on the 23 March 2011. The intension of the Forum is to ensure effective and efficient measures of managing the local environment in a sustainable fashion which seeks to balance social, economic and natural needs so that the current generation can meet its needs without undermining the ability of future generations to meet their needs. The WEMAF, a permanent broad-based multi-stakeholder forum, will assess, advise, share, raise awareness, render support and take an active leading role in formulating, promoting, enforcing and implementing various environmentally related policies, programmes, plans, projects and activities within the jurisdiction of Walvis Bay in partnership with WBM and the main stakeholders. The WEMAF terms of reference were finalized and agreed upon and seek to define the roles and functions of the WEMAF for the management of Walvis Bay unique environment, facilitating the interaction between nature, society and the economy.

D. To Mainstream, Build-on, Align and Support existing Sustainable Development & Plans, Programs, Policies (PPP) and Development Agendas of our city. All the city’s policies, plan, programmes and development agendas do not take the impacts of climate change and or loss of biodiversity into account. It is thus the intention of council to mainstream all our PPP and development agendas as per capacity development initiatives with our strategic partners (ICLEI, UN-Habitat & MRLGHRD) and through networking and WEMAF coordination endeavors.

2. BIODIVERSITY MANAGEMENT Council realized long ago that biodiversity forms the basis of its citizens’ well-being and that its preservation is critical to the sustainable growth of the entire economy of Walvis Bay and the Namibian nation at large for both present and future benefits. Hence, the Municipality of Walvis Bay decided to fully integrate biodiversity issues and concerns into Council’s local planning and policy making processes. Council thus has and is embarking upon various initiatives to promote the sustainable protection, utilization and management of biodiversity. The concluded Walvis Bay Local Agenda (WB LA) 21 Project and the emanating-ongoing Environmental Fund of the Municipality of Walvis Bay are among some of the best-practices the Council can proud itself. The most recent and prominent initiative is the Local Action for Biodiversity (LAB) Project. This 3-year project, ending in June 2009, focus on enhancing planning and management of biodiversity at the local level and was initiated by the International Council for Local Environmental initiatives (ICLEI) of which the Municipality of Walvis Bay is a member since 2003. A total of 21 Global Pioneering local governments’ were taking part in the ICLEI LAB I Project. Walvis Bay (the only from Namibia), Cape Town, Ekurhuleni, Durban and Johannesburg were the only participants from Africa. ICLEI again registered cities for LAB II and more information on this can be obtained on the website: www.iclei.org/lab

The Council invited various local stakeholders (such as the CETN, Namport, Ministry of Environment and Tourism, Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Municipality of Swakopmund, NACOMA Project, Friends of the Swakop River Mouth, Erongo Regional Council, Topnaar Traditional Council, Walvis Bay Salt Refiners, Gobabeb Training and Research Centre

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and the Quality Managers Forum of the fish processing industry) to serve as the steering committee during the launch of the Walvis Bay Local Action for Biodiversity (WB LAB) Project in 2007.

At the end of the project Walvis Bay envisaged to achieve the following milestones:  Development of a biodiversity report that documents the current state of biodiversity and its management within Walvis Bay;  Ensuring long-term commitment by city leadership to sustainable biodiversity management, through Walvis Bay formally signing a local government biodiversity declaration;  Development of a 10-year biodiversity action plan and framework that will include commitments to biodiversity implementation plans and integration within broader city plans as well as formal acceptance of their 10-year biodiversity action plans and frameworks by Council, and  Implementation of five new on-the-ground biodiversity interventions by the end of the three-year project.

After inputs from the various stakeholders the Municipality of Walvis Bay is proud to inform that the first milestone, of producing the Walvis Bay Biodiversity Report, was completed and launched on the 04th October 2008, which could be downloaded from the municipal website: www.walvisbaycc.org.na

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Equally Council achieved the second milestone by becoming a signatory to both the Countdown 2010 Declaration and Durban Commitment which were signed by the Mayor of Walvis Bay in Durban during the second LAB workshop in September 2008.

Countdown 2010 Declaration is a global strategic partner initiative to the LAB Project, which seek to achieve a significant reduction in the current global loss rate of biological diversity by the year 2010. The Durban Commitment, on the other hand, is a commitment for local authorities to protect and enhance biodiversity at the local level. Both these Commitment and Declaration are:

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 Globally relevant and addresses local government issues within a global intention and contribution;  A commitment and acknowledgement of local government responsibility and accountability to biodiversity outcomes, goals and principles, and  While being meaningful at the specific local level, are able to globally position and enhance identity of signatory local governments.

Furthermore, and as the last milestone, Council managed to implement three of the five on- the-ground biodiversity interventions, namely:  The revision and approval of the Walvis Bay Integrated Environmental Policy was achieved in March 2008. This policy could also be downloaded from the municipal website;  The approval to integrate and to add other stakeholders on the WB LA 21 Project Steering Committee as the new WB LAB PSC was resolved during a Stakeholder’s Meeting on the 14 February 2008, and  The continuation of the Coastal Area Action Plan activities as a responsibility of the new WB LAB PSC was also agreed upon during the same meeting.

The main challenge that faced the successful completion of the entire WB LAB Project was the last two on-the-ground biodiversity interventions as well as the third overall WB LAB Project milestone which dealt with the “Planning/Development and Implementation of a 10-year Biodiversity Action plan and Framework” that included commitments to biodiversity implementation plans and integration within the broader stakeholders plans. This was a challenge because the Ministry of Environment and Tourism (MET) through the Namibian Coast Conservation and Management (NACOMA) Project, which were two of the key WB LAB PSC were in the process of declaring the entire Namibian coast as a nature reserve. Stakeholder consultations were completed for the proclamation of the new Coastal Park. Proclamation and gazette notices were prepared and completed and the name Dorob National Park was adopted. Namibia now have one of the world‘s best protected coastlines - joining the Skeleton Coast, Dorob, Namib-Naukluft and Sperrgebiet National parks creating the largest park in Africa and one of the top ten largest conservation areas in the world.

The City Council of Walvis Bay participated and contributed to the NACOMA project since its inception on various platforms and activities and the NACOMA Project is now in the final stages of establishing a permanent and officially recognized body (which will include the Municipality of Walvis Bay) for the management and coordination of the Dorob National Park. Visit the NACOMA website at www.nacoma.org.na for more information on the NACOMA Project and related project documents.

The other main challenge facing the WB LAB Project is the ability to make the third and final participation fee of U$ 15,000 to ICLEI. Council managed to make two payments of U$ 10,000

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and U$ 15,000 from the total participation fee of U$ 40,000 through contributions from Namib Films and the WB LA 21 Project. Council could also not officially participate to ICLEI’s LAB II Project due to the lack of a second participant fee of U$ 50,000. ICLEI has however also accepted the Municipality of Walvis Bay as a LAB II Project participant to date.

3. CLIMATE CHANGE MANAGEMENT The decision to form strategic partners has resulted in two climate change initiatives namely: “BUILDING CAPACITIES OF LOCAL GOVERNMENTS IN AFRICA TO COPE WITH CLIMATE CHANGE” with the UN-Habitat and “SUB-SAHARAN AFRICAN CITIES: A FIVE-CITY NETWORK TO PIONEER CLIMATE ADAPTATION TROUGH PARTICIPATORY RESEARCH AND LOCAL ACTION” with ICLEI-SA.

The UN-Habitat project aims to develop the capacities of local government and their citizens to better cope with the effects of climate change at the local level. The overall development objective of this project is to strengthen the capacities of five local cities governments in the Africa region on climate change mitigation and adaptation measures. Given the vulnerability of coastal cities to climate change, this project is giving due consideration to this regions by selecting at least two coastal city, of which one is Walvis Bay.

UN-Habitat, based on its long-lasting experience in increasing capacities at the local level, intends to contribute with this project to enhance the collaboration between cities and the national level in order to improve the synergies and links between climate change policies at the different levels, to support climate change networks for an improved cooperation and policy dialogue on mitigation and adaptation to climate change in Africa. To this end, among others, one partners meeting will be organized, good practices will be published and a climate change action handbook for local decision-makers and planners will be developed. The project will be linked to existing and new projects within UN-HABITAT (for example, SUD-Net cities in climate change initiative, Cities Alliance and the Lake Victoria initiative). The project is being executed over 2 years. The ultimate goal is to contribute to achieving MDG goal 1 and 7. For its execution, UN-HABITAT will closely cooperate with UNEP and the UN Development Programme (UNDP) country offices where UN-HABITAT Programme Managers are located in country. Other partner will include among others ICLEI-SA, relevant national ministries (MRLGHRD & MET) as well as regional (Erongo) and local city stakeholders.

The “Sub-Saharan African Cities: A Five-City Network to Pioneer Climate Adaptation through Participatory Research and Local Action” project aims to address the knowledge, resource, capacity and networking gaps of five Southern African cities by strengthening their ability to plan for, and adapt to, the impacts associated with climate change. The overarching objectives of this project are:  To develop 5 tailor-made adaptation frameworks for managing the increased risk to African local government and their communities due to climate change impact.  To establish a standardised approach for the collection and analyses of climatic base- line data which will assist future localised projections to assist in planning and decision making procedures.

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Specific Objectives are: 1) To establish (and/or build upon) multi-disciplinary, multi-sectoral stakeholder platforms in five Southern African cities comprising of academics, communities and the local government in order to facilitate knowledgesharing, promote proactive climate adaptation and resource opportunities available for African cities with the view to ensure long-term sustainability. 2) Identify and understand the current and projected risks associated with climate change impacts for African local governments and communities. 3) Facilitate communities to identify and test current and alternative adaptation methods and strategies to cope with risks associated to climate change. 4) To strengthen and increase the capacity and knowledge of local communities and governments through effective education and communication of climate change science and risks. 5) To develop and/or build on overarching Local Climate Adaptation Frameworks (LCAFs) for a city-wide consolidated and coordinated approach to reducing vulnerability to short- to medium-term climate impacts for each of the five project cities.

The five urban centres chosen for this project are Cape Town, South Africa, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; Maputo, Mozambique; Walvis Bay, Namibia; and Port St. Louis, Mauritius. Each of the cities chosen are allocated a climatic variable that they are already considered to be under immediate threat to, in the extreme sense, to allow for detailed examination. Research will be structured around the following local government sectors: water and sanitation, energy, transport, health and livelihoods for each of the chosen cities. The climatic variables allocated to each of the cities are:  Cape Town, South Africa – Increasing temperatures;  Dar es Salaam, Tanzania – Changes in precipitation and rainfall patterns (drought);  Maputo, Mozambique – Changes in precipitation and rainfall patterns (flooding);  Port St. Louis, Mauritius – Changes in wind speed, and  Walvis Bay, Namibia – Increases in sea level (permanent and non permanent).

So far a desktop study was carried out in conjunction with each of the two Walvis Bay visits. The aim of the study is to assimilate existing knowledge, on both a local and global scale pertaining to the aforementioned climatic variables. Further to this it also aims to explore current and alternative adaptation measures and strategies. The establishment of the WEMAF, with at least three stakeholder platforms namely; local government, local communities and local academic institutions it is hoped the project will ensure participation from a diverse range of actors within the local system. Due to participation within the stakeholder platforms it is hoped that the project will increase the capacity of the stakeholders enabling them to make informed and proactive decisions regarding climate change and its impacts across all sectors. On the other hand, a Project Steering Committee (PSC) with representatives from WEMAF and ICLEI-SA staff will enable participation, coordination and integration amongst all stakeholders as well as upstream with the rest of the project cities and through ICLEI’s networks, also beyond this specific project.

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The second workshop, out of a total series of three workshops took place and was reported under the heading: “Walvis Bay identifies flooding, increased winds speeds and sea level rise as the greatest climatic risks for the town.“as follows:

Figure 1: ICLEI Africa working together with Walvis Bay Municipality to increase climate change resilience!

Walvis Bay Municipality, Namibia hosted ICLEI Africa’s Climate Change Adaptation team at the Kuisebmond Training Centre, Walvis Bay from 12 – 13 April 2011. The aim of the participatory stakeholder workshop was to prioritise and identify the significant climatic risks that is being felt and observed within Walvis Bay. And then secondly, to identify locally appropriate adaptation options that would likely increase the town’s resilience and preparedness towards climatic changes that are currently and anticipated to occur in the near future.

The workshop was officially opened by Mr Kevin Adams, Personal Relations Manager, Walvis Bay Municipality on behalf of the Mayor, Honourable Derek Klazen. Mr David Uushona, Manager of Solid Waste and Environment, Walvis Bay Municipality presented the key structure of the newly formed Walvis Bay Environmental Management Advisory Forum (WEMAF) which was a key outcome from the first meeting that took place 23 March 2011. WEMAF acts as a permanent broad-based multi- stakeholder forum, which intends to advice and take an equally active leading role in the formulating, promoting, enforcing and implementing of various environment related activities within the jurisdictional area of Walvis Bay in partnership with WBM and all the main stakeholders.

The workshop also included interactive presentations by Ms Lucinda Fairhurst, ICLEI Africa Adaptation Coordinator who gave an overview of the project outcomes; the risks identified during the last consultative stakeholder workshop in Walvis Bay in June 2010, an overview of the climatic systems analysis report for Walvis Bay and closed the day’s activities with a brief overview of the concept of climate risk.

The second day’s items on the agenda were purely consultative participatory activities whereby the stakeholders engaged with an ICLEI Africa climate change tool called: Local Interactive Climate Change Risk and Adaptation Prioritisation Training Tool (in short: Local RAP Tool). This tool allowed participants to engage with each other and prioritise the climatic variable that was thought to be increasing the town’s vulnerability and the second part of the session was to identify locally appropriate adaptation options to increase the town’s resilience towards these changes and variability in climate. The Walvis Bay stakeholders identified sea Level Rise, wind, flooding and increasing temperatures as the main variables that are causing continuous impacts and risks upon the infrastructure and service delivery of

By: David Uushona – May 2011 Page 10 the local government. For more information on the project, the project cities as well as the workshop outcomes, please visit the ICLEI Africa’s website at http://www.iclei.org/index.php?id=africa-adaptation

N.B. For all actions and processes undertaken within this project we aim to focus on the urban-poor, whom are considered to be highly vulnerable to climate change e.g. the Topnaar community. Therefore in all aspects of this project care will be taken to ensure that the Topnaar community has an active and participatory role within decision making.

4. THE WAY FORWARD

4.1. As per my presentation in Nairobi recently - The Municipality of Walvis Bay’s long-term monitoring programme collects data from the coastal area. The data collected is aimed at increasing the understanding of the natural processes and human impacts affecting the coastal area. The Coastal Area is made up of the Walvis Bay Lagoon, a significant habitat for shorebirds and seabirds that was declared a Ramsar Convention wetland in 1995; the bay and harbour; and the Pelican Point Peninsula which protects the town's important harbour and fishing industry.

Data collected within the coastal area (using electronic data recorders) includes water level, water temperature, wind speed and direction, turbidity, organic matter, e.t.c. Unlike the hourly spot readings recorded by most electronic stations in Namibia, the equipment used by the Municipality of Walvis Bay records the averages of the various parameters at 10 minutes intervals. This makes the data very detailed. Bird counts are also carried out in collaboration with a local environmental NGO (Coastal Environmental Trust of Namibia). Land based surveys are also conducted by professional surveyors on behalf of the municipality every second year (the survey intervals will be changed to every five years in due course) to record changes in depths along transects of the Lagoon due to siltation and to record the changes of the Pelican Point Peninsula.

We will thus ensure that the long-term coastal area monitoring activities are continued with in order to produce accurate and meaningful data to make informed environmental management decisions. The importance of properly function monitoring stations and accurate data can not be over emphasized (note latest stations’ maintenance report attached).

4.2. The Municipality of Walvis Bay will continue encouraging its citizens/community to get involve, participate and take ownership in the management of the city’s ecosystems as enshrined in our IEP. This will be achieved through “Environmental Education & Awareness” (EEA) outreach programme and campaigns, which presently is lacking. The Environmental Fund will also assist in this regard. The Municipality of Walvis Bay invited PROJECT PROPOSALS from any individual, organisation or institution to submit proposals to the ENVIRONMENTAL FUND for financing activities and initiatives that facilitate the proper management of the environment and natural resources within the territorial jurisdiction of the Municipality of Walvis Bay, with the closing date for the 2011/12 being the 23 May 2011.

Project proposals should support and be consistent with Municipal management policies, plans and programmes (PPP). Such projects should in particular:  be supportive of the municipality's "Integrated Environmental Policy";

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 be successfully implementable, and have the capacity for adaptation and replication;  include local participation and benefit local groups;  integrate environment, social and economic considerations as well as promote national, regional and local development PPP, and  promote sustainability, and work towards local environmental enhancement.

This Fund has already supported a number of community initiated proposal since 2004 and the Environmental Section within the Municipality of Walvis Bay will continue to be in charge of the day-to-day management of the Environmental Fund and meeting on a quarterly basis, or at such time as the need arises.

4.3. Of most importance is for the Municipality of Walvis Bay to continuously improve on the implementation of the four main strategic decisions as discussed under section 1.3 of this narrative summary for efficient and effective management of our environment.

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