WANTON FELLING OF TREES AND DESTRUCTION OF VEGETATION IS POSING SERIOUS ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION OF GWASSI HILLS AS WELL AS CAUSING ACUTE SHORTAGE OF FOOD GRAINS.

An Environmental Feature By Leo Odera Omolo In Mbita Town.

A concerted effort is underway to rescue the Gwassi Hills from further environmental degradation and destruction of rain forest.

gwassi Hills have gone dramatic and systematic degradation in the last fifty years, which saw the destruction of its forest, which for many years had also served as rain catchment areas.

The main component of this degradation is the continued decimation of its forest resources for immediate short-term subsistence needs of the local communities and for long term commercial purposes..

Other component of environment degradation are population pressure on available land, soil erosion, encroachment by farmers and the indiscriminate burning of the forest.

The Gwassi Hills a confgolemaration of 24 high and steep hills located in what used to be Suba District until early this year hen President Mwai Kibaki announced its sub-division and the creation of a new administrative district called ‘Gwassi” district in an area ,which previously covered the entire Gwassi Parliamentary constituency electoral area.

The district has an area of 1,048 km2 and is one of the 35 or so new administrative districts in Kenya’s Nyanza Province.This district is located in South-west parts of Kenya along Lake Victoria. It is an ideally serving as the frontier between the Kenya-Uganda border inside Lake Victoria..

Gwasii Hills are under serious and severe environmental stress. Indiscriminate and wanton destruction of forest of Gwassi Hills is taking place on large scale and unabated.

This rapid depletion of resources in the region is taking place due to a number of factors including, the recent massive immigration of people to the region from other regions of Kenya, uncoordinated felling of trees for building, charcoal burning and cutting of wood fuel

Other contributing factors include the clearing of forest bushes for farming, cultivation of bhang cannabis sativa],lack of sustainable utilization of resources provided by the hills, inadequate forestry guards and rangers to address the problems, accidental and deliberate fire outbreaks.

Deforestation of is proceeding at such a rates that it is likely to catalyze exogenous processes hat have the potential. Of destroying the entire environment and hence drastically reduce the production capacity of the hills.

Depletion of resources of the Gwassi Hills has had many serious consequences. The weather pattern and climatic conditions have changed resulting in unreliable rainfall, reduced water flow from springs upstream, increased soil erosion, emergence of deep galleys, loss of biodiversity, reduced crop yields, loss of aesthetic beau of the environment and the siltation of the shores of Lake Victoria. Some of the hills have turned into dry Savannah. Furthermore. because of environmental degradation, the economy of the region is also adversely affected..by large scale destruction.

He reduction in relief rainfall has translated into reduced agricultural productivity, food deficit and Abject poverty in the hitherto one of the richest and food high yielding region along the Lake Victoria.

The present situation dramatically contrasts with the past when these Hills used to be a paradise of wild fruits ,rare species of indigenous trees, plants of medicinal value unique creepers, and wild vegetables.

The hills also provided important forest products such as timber and building poles ,not to mention scenic and aesthetic beauty of its flora and fauna. These were God’s free gifts of nature to human kind .In terms of resources endowments few places can rival Gwassi Hills.

GWASII Hills are located approximately 40 kilometers to the South-West of Homa-Bay town in HomaBay district, and about 20 kilometers south-east of Mbita point town in Mbita district.. Other additional attraction is the Gwassi hills are overlooking the two major fishing and densely polulated Islands, namely Mfangano and Rusinga, and another smaller islands like Kiwa, Takawiti.Remba, Ringiti,Pyramid and the contentious Migingo island, which is currently the source of furious diplomatic spat between Kenya and between Kenya and Uganda.

The Hills lie between latitude of 0o31,0038’8 and longititude 34 0,15E..The Hills rise an altitude of 1,000 meters at the upon hilly plateau These hills form a series that seem to have fragmented by donatives processes from much larger Volcanic cone of a base approximately 80 kilometers in diameter almost he . size of Mt. Elgon.

The district ‘s altitude varies from 1,143 meters to 2,134 meters above the sea level. The main relief feature in the district is the upland plateau, which is composes undulating surface characterized by residual highlands of which Gwassi Hills are to the south and Gembe Hills to the north of the district.

The unique Ruma Hills is to the far south east. It is unique, because here is the only place in Kenya and the entire African continent with rare white antelopes, which is the size of duikers but slightly small than

Impala. It is called in the local Luo vernacular Ojuaya or Nyajuaya, and it lives up on he hill-top and rarely come down for waters, The antelopes are estimated to number about 200,though there are report of their number getting dwindling by days due to intensive poaching by the local communities.

Nyajuaya is slightly smaller than the beautiful Sitatunga, which loves the swampy land as its habitat. Its presence has slipped off the minds of the Kenya Wildlife Service, which has a well staffed camp at the nearby Ruma National Game Park, the home of another rare antelope, the Roan Antelope.

Gwassi district has hinterland equatorial type of climate that is modified by effects of altitude and closeness o Lake Victoria which lowers the temperature. Thus the weather around the lake is pleasant all the year round.

The first mass bush clearing in Gwassi Hills was reported in 1954.However,iit was until 1970s when some immigrants and local people started to settle on the main Gwassi Hill Forest, though by the time it had already been gazette by the government as a forestland..

These people “invaders” were engaged in massive forest destructive activities, which include cultivation, pit sawing, charcoal burning and bhang growing.

By the year 1984, these activities had turned large area of forestland into farmland. In the same year and with the assistance of the Provincial Administration in Nyanza Province the squatters who had encroached on the forestland were forcefully evicted.

These eviction were later halted abruptly only after when it was discovered and realized that some of the illegal squatters had fraudulently obtained the official registration number of their farms. However, with the assistance of the Ministry of Lands and Settlement, the registration of their parcel numbers s were duly nullified in 1988.The number of the illegal squatters at that time was said to be

Victoria, the sport fishing on Rusinga and Takawiri Island and wide island and a wide variety of birds in the various provide very important tourist attraction sites in the district.

Ends

Leoderaomoloyahoo.com

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From: Leo Odera Omolo
Date: Sunday, June 7, 2009, 11:19 AM
Subject: destruction of Gwassi hills forestland poses thgreat to manking