Cheryl-Samantha Owen

The Tana River Delta, one of Kenya’s last coastal wildernesses, is the floodplain ecosystem of the mighty Tana, a river born on the slopes of Mt Kenya that finishes its 1014km journey in East Africa’s Indian Ocean. Its complex wetlands comprise a mixture of salt, fresh and brackish lakes and tributaries; riverine forest, woodland and bushland; mangroves (including Kenya’s only population of Heriteria littoralis and the threatened Xylocarpus grantum and Bruguiera gymnorrhiza); and extensive grasslands. This great diversity of intact habitats combined with its vast expanse has made the Delta an internationally important site for bird conservation (22 species of international importance have been recorded and it is a critical foraging and breeding ground for thousands of resident and migratory water birds – earlier this year 15000 water birds of 69 species were counted on one day alone); a vital breeding, spawning and nursery ground for fish; and the home for a significant number of wildlife (including the rare East African coastal subspecies of Topi, Damaiscus lunatus topi , elephant, crocodile and hippo).

Although few other places on earth can claim to have elephants swim across mangrove channels and witness lions roaming the beaches it has received no formal protection and the Delta is currently facing destruction by a major (not-so sweet) sugarcane project, which is threatening over 33 000 ha of wetland. The environmental and social implications are significant, as the plantations will stretch into the heart of the wetlands transforming the Delta’s diversity into an ecological desert. According to Colin Jackson, the director of A Rocha Kenya, a conservation organization committed to the sustainable use and conservation of endangered habitats and species, major questions still need to be addressed concerning effluent pollution released from the sugar factory and the containment of sewage and rubbish generated by the large influx of workers from outside the area. The local Orma pastoralists, who have used these wetlands as grazing areas for their livestock for generations, are opposed to the project and elsewhere in Kenya sugarcane has proven to bring far more poverty than relief.