Investing in Lake Chad
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Investing in Lake Chad
The Lake Chad Basin is of great economic importance but faces significant challenges.
By Leon Louw founder of WhyAfrica and editor of the WhyAfrica magazine.
The Lake Chad Basin continues to be plagued by insecurity, droughts and extreme weather.
Despite these challenges, the region has great economic importance due to its location on cross-border corridors, offering good prospects for local communities once security has been re-established.
Renewed efforts are underway to stabilise the region and to revitalise local economies.
Lake Chad is located in the far west of Chad and the northeast of Nigeria. Parts of the lake also extend to Niger and Cameroon.
It is fed mainly by the Chari River through the Lagone tributary, which used to provide 90% of its water. It was once Africa’s largest water reservoir in the Sahel region, covering an area of about 26,000km2, about the size of the US state of Maryland and bigger than Israel or Kuwait (source: United Nations Renewal Magazine). By 2001 the lake covered less than one-fifth of that area.
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC), a regional body that regulates the use of the basin’s water and other natural resources, maintain that inefficient damming and irrigation methods on the part of the countries bordering the lake are partly responsible for its shrinkage.
Emmanuel Asuquo-Obot of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), an organisation devoted to wildlife conservation, points to the diversion of water from the Chari River to irrigation projects and dams along the Jama’are and Hadejia Rivers in northeastern Nigeria.
The security situation in Chad’s Lac and Hadjer Lamis provinces and the north of Cameroon has deteriorated over the last few years, mainly due to the presence of Boko Haram and other non-government armed groups.
The situation has resulted in the internal displacement of more than 427,000 people in northern Cameroon and over 381,000 people in the area around Lake Chad on the Chadian side, including a large share of women and children.
Funding for stabilisation
Earlier this month, the African Development Bank Group approved a package of USD17.97-million to Cameroon and Chad to bolster efforts to stabilise the Lake Chad Basin.
The project has three components:
- Improving security and access to justice, and restoring resilient essential services
- Revitalising local economies and creating sustainable, climate-sensitive jobs for women and young people
- Strengthening social cohesion and regional cooperation.
It will target the provinces of Lac and Hadjer Lamis in Chad and the northern regions of Cameroon.
Tensions rise
According to a recent article by journalist Ahmad Salkida for the UN magazine African renewal the impact of the drying lake is causing tensions among communities around Lake Chad.
“There are repeated conflicts among nationals of different countries over control of the remaining water. Cameroonians and Nigerians in Darak village, for example, constantly fight over the water.
“Nigerians claim to be the first settlers in the village, while Cameroonians invoke nationalistic sentiments, since the village is within Cameroonian territory. Fishermen also want farmers and herdsmen to cease diverting lake water to their farmlands and livestock,” says Salkida in his article.
Already the World Bank is providing USD10.6-million for a project to reverse land and water degradation in parts of the lake. In addition, livestock herders are being educated on gaining access to grazing and watering areas. Water users are taught efficient water-utilisation methods and fishermen more appropriate techniques for catching fish.
Investing in Lake Chad
