National Level Review Of GPA Guidelines And The Status of Municipal Wastewater Management In Kenya A NATIONAL STATUS REPORT By Saeed M Mwaguni Coast Development Authority P.O. Box 1322-80100 GPO Mombasa Email: [email protected] July 2007 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I take this opportunity to acknowledge the support of the institutions and individuals who contributed to the successful completion of this report. My special thanks goes to the Managing Director, Coast Development Authority (CDA), for giving me time from the busy schedules of the office, which enabled me to have enough time to concentrated on developing this report. The free hand I was given to use the resources of the District Information and Documentation Center situated within the CDA Office headquarters, meant that I did have to travel far and wide to access to documented government information and publications. Many thanks also go to the Director, Kenya Marie and Fisheries Research Institute (KMFRI), Mombasa, Kenya for granting me unlimited access to their library. Dr. Daniel Munga in particular made available many up to date and relevant documents which significantly contributed to the finalization of the report. Harrison On’ganda, helped to provide the maps on short notice and his contribution is hereby greatly acknowledged. Many thanks are also extended to the Mombasa Water and Sewerage Company (MAWASCO) for information on the state of the sewerage infrastructure in Mombasa District and on this note Mr. John Mwamburi and Mwawugaga Mwamboto are hereby acknowledged. The UNEP/GEF WIO-LaB Project Management Unit at the UNEP Headquarters, Gigiri, Nairobi, is acknowledged for making available necessary guidelines and documentation, which guided the study. The support of Dr. Peter Scheren and Dr. Johnson Kitheka came in handy throughout the period this report was being prepared. Dr. Sixtus Kayombo, of the University of Dar-es-Salaam, a Regional Expert on Municipal Wastewater Management offered invaluable advice during the entire duration of preparing this report. I wish to thank him most sincerely for tolerating many of the questions I posed to him, which he answered with a lot of zest. I would also like to recognize the major role played by the Nairobi Convention Secretariat housed at the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA), headquarters, Nairobi. Special thanks go to Stephen Katua, Salome Machua and Caroline Anyango for the preliminary inputs, which enabled the WIO-LaB Project Management Unit to pass on the task of undertaking this exercise to me. To you all, I say, thank you very much. This report has been prepared within the framework of the UNEP-GEF WIO-LaB Project: Addressing Land Based Activities, which impact on the coastal freshwater and marine environments in the Western Indian Ocean Region in general, but, with specific interest for action in Kenya. The report has been prepared targeting Decision-Makers providing them with the necessary information to trigger interest in them to implement both remedial and sustainable actions on wastewater management to help reduce stress on coastal ecosystems. The report has also been developed as a contribution to strengthen the regional legal basis for preventing land based sources of pollution, including implementation of the Global Program of Action (GPA); and to help develop regional capacity and strengthen institutions in the Western Indian Ocean region for sustainable development, less polluting development including the implementation of the Nairobi Convention. And my final acknowledgement, therefore, is to laud all those involved in this effort. ii EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The national level review of the GPA guidelines on Municipal Wastewater Management and the preparation of this National Status Report on municipal wastewater management in Kenya have been undertaken recognizing that the marine and coastal environment of the countries of Western Indian is rich in natural resources, but stressed by municipal wastewater discharges. This prompted the need for action to reducing the stress on the ecosystems by improving sediment and water quality, strengthening the regional legal basis for preventing land based sources of pollution including implementation of the GPA Guidelines; and to develop regional capacity for sustainable development of the countries including implementation of the Nairobi Convention. This National Status report has therefore been prepared guided by Terms of Reference developed specifically to capture Key Principles of the GPA Guidelines on Municipal Wastewater Management. The Kenya Coast supports important habitats that are highly productive, providing the foundation of Kenya’s coastal economy through tourism, fisheries and agriculture. However, the human activities of the residents of this region, projected to be 2,927,273 (10.2 %) people in the year 2006 and growing at the rate of 3.1 % p.a. compared to the national average of 2.9 % p.a. is placing significant pressure on the coastal environment undermining the resource base for which its economy depends on. To alleviate this, efforts must be undertaken to reduce the volume of municipal wastewater discharges, which in turn requires an enabling environment in the form of Policy, Regulatory Framework and Institutional arrangements. For the case of Kenya, Sessional Paper No. 1 of 1999 provides that environment. This Paper placed a high social and economic value on water and put in place the necessary institutional arrangements and a pricing policy that meet equity, economic, financial and environment objectives for wastewater management. The paper has promoted the participation and engagement of the private sector and other stakeholders in wastewater management and placed the burden of municipal wastewater management to the polluter. Mechanisms for enforcement for compliance of the Laws and Regulations were identified as monitoring and inspection, restoration orders, punitive measures, and the use of economic instruments. Institutional infrastructures to implement these were also established, though not yet strong relative to the tasks due to lack of personnel, logistics problems and weak financial base. The other weakness lies in the lack of harmony in the laws of the other institutions with a stake in water matters, which require to be reviewed. Similarly, as the WIO region countries developed their policies and regulation on a sectoral approach, they cannot be applied throughout the Region. To change this, there is need to harmonize the standards on water quality and develop and adopt a regional Protocol for Water and Sediment quality monitoring taking into consideration, capacity building and sustainable financing mechanisms for systematic data collection to aid action on wastewater. Kenya has the institutional arrangements with specific functions in the development and management of its water resources. There is proper allocation of roles and responsibilities and the separation of policy, regulatory, monitoring and coordination from water supply and sanitation services. However, the service providers are yet to engage in serious wastewater management, as at the moment, they only concentrate on water supply services. Similarly, the level of awareness and participation on waste management in Kenya is still very low, with private sector playing a very minimal role despite the assured political will. An assessment of the existing financial mechanism shows that most of the funding for the water sector comes from the donors in the ratio of 6:4. This however, is bound to change in the future as the new financial arrangements favour raising funds from domestic sources, which will guarantee stability and financial sustainability in the sector. iii This study has however found that the policy, the regulatory framework, and institutional arrangements for municipal wastewater management in Kenya to be very adequate, and the same can be said for the financial mechanisms. Now, all that is required is implementation and enforcement, which remains weak. An inventory of the MWW management infrastructure has shown that three types of sanitation systems are in use along the Kenya coast. These systems are the on-site sanitation through pit latrines and septic/tank-soakage pit systems; and the conventional water borne sanitation. The extent of use of these systems depended on the category of human settlement served, with informal settlements using pit latrines almost exclusively, and the planned urban settlements relying on the septic-tank/soakage pit system. Only a few settlements and beach hotels are served by water borne sanitation. Population projections show that the majority of the people in coast province are found concentrated in towns of the coastal urban centers and constitute the pollution hot spots resulting from municipal wastewater discharges into the marine environment untreated. Overall, the municipal wastewater is disposed off initially underground through septic tanks/soak pits and pit latrines, but later disposed off as sludge on land at designated sites, contributing to (BOD5), nutrients, and pathogens into water bodies. Industrial establishments, mostly located in Mombasa generally do not pre-treat their effluents before discharge. These establishments, either discharge their effluent into the municipal storm-water sewer system, or, discharge into vertical drains underground. Thus industrial establishments are major source of biochemical oxygen demand (BOD5), suspended solids (SS).and metal contamination to water bodies. The rivers