It is sunrise on Monday morning in Rutsiro District, in the mountainous western edge of Rwanda. A group of men, women and youth, their faces covered in masks to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 are ready to start work carving radical terraces into the steep slopes of the Kajugujugu site of Murunda Sector, Rutsiro District.
Photo: IUCN ESARO
In recent years, limited economic opportunities has compelled people living in Sebeya Catchment to depend on the limited land base for intensive livestock grazing and subsistence agriculture. This has led to continual degradation of the Sebeya Catchment. Heavily grazed, deforested and denuded slopes are highly susceptible to surface run-off during heavy rains, carving deep gullies, triggering landslides, downstream flooding resulting in economic damage, loss of life and livelihoods to list just afew concerns.
The Embedding Integrated Water Resources Management (EWRM) project is being implemented across 4 administrative districts: Rubavu, Rutsiro, Ngororero and Nyabihu in Western Province of Rwanda using a participatory community approach that not only engages people through casual labour on landscape restoration works but also provides them with opportunities to contribute to the planning of interventions through the Village Land Use Action Planning (VLUAP) processes being led by the EWMR Technical Assistance Consortium.
Murwanashyaka Emmanuel has been practicing agriculture as a source of his household-income. Referring to his experience, he endorses these measures saying since the radical terraces were developed on his small plot his agricultural production has increased. He has since observed fields which were no longer productive now providing improved yields.
Photo: IUCN RWANDA
“We are fortunate that this project is helping us to develop terraces on our lands, it will help me personally to cultivate all my fields which were on steep slopes, and I will be able to produce more from them,” says Emmanuel.
“Being involved in the project, we have learnt many techniques of conserving our soil by using various conservation practices such as developing radical and progressive terraces,” says Nyirakadari Antoinette, one of the ladies working on the project.
Vestine Nyirahakuzimana, is another farmer whose land was prone to erosion by the Sebeya River in Kanama sector, Rubavu District where flooding has been destroying crops and infrastructure such as roads, bridges, schools, churches, hydropower plants, water treatment plants and even claiming lives of people during periods of heavy rain.
Today, Vestine is among more than 8,000 small-holder farmers in Rubavu district who are benefiting from casual labour jobs amid the COVID-19 pandemic, working on measures designed to mitigate flooding.
She reports that previously she had no job beyond tilling a small, steep plot of land on the site where terraces are currently being constructed.
“This work is helping me to feed my family at a time when the corona virus pandemic has greatly affected our local economy. I am spending part of the money i earn earned to subscribe to community based-health insurance and pension scheme known as Ejo Heza and i have even managed to buy two sheep,” she says.
Ejo Heza is intended to improve the welfare of workers in the informal sector once they retire as result of old age, debilitating diseases or accidents resulting from occupational hazards.
“Through our work building terraces, we save part of our income for Ejo Heza payments. We are paid after every 15 days and each of us saves Rwf 1, 300,” says Jean Paul .
Photo: IUCN ESARO
Nyirakadari Colette, a 60 year-old farmer with five children in Arusha Village, Nyabihu District is thankful to the project for having provided her with rainwater harvesting tanks at no cost.
”It was challenge for us to find water in this area, and even when it rained we had to carry water from a distant source and carefully manage its use. Today we are happy that the Sebeya Project has provided us with a much better option to obtain water for our household use,” says Colette.
“When farmers work to protect soil, they are restoring the health of their farmland and this provides them with multiple benefits”, adds Colette.
In Ngororero District, in the upstream area of the Sebeya Catchment, activities in the field include the construction of radical terraces in Bambiro village, Rutagara cell, Muhanda Sector. This work has provided 4,274 people with temporary jobs along with10 site technicians, five surveyors and four data entry clerks.
These radical terraces haves been endorsed as a good solution for improved environment protection by reducing soil erosion.
Charles Karangwa, IUCN's Regional Technical Coordinator/ Rwanda Country Representative, Forests, Landscapes and Livelihoods Programme, Eastern and Southern Africa commented that the Embassy of the Netherlands, through the Sebeya EWMR Project, is making important investments in the sustainable development and improved livelihoods of people in Western Province who depend on the Sebeya River for their livelihoods and drinking water.
According to a recent assessment conducted by a joint monitoring team made up of theTechnical Assistance Consortium members, Rwanda Water Resources Board and Districts, initiatives implemented under EWMR have started bearing fruits for the communities in the catchment.
Timmo Gaasbeek, Water Expert and First Secretary for Water and Environment at the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Kigali, notes that the project has started improving citizens’ livelihoods.
“The participatory village and community ownership approach has fast-tracked the project implementation. The achievements have played a pivotal role in transforming citizens’ lives. There is hope to achieve more ahead,” notes Timmo.
Prime Ngabonziza, the Director General of Rwanda Water Resources Board, explains that the mult-billion Rwandan Franc initiative is meant to address problems such as Sebeya River flooding that negatively impact local residents.
“There is an enormous need to end woes caused by the river through various activities implemented under this project such as afforestation, dams’ creation, trenches’ digging, promotion of agroforestry, climate, small gullies rehabilitation, radical terraces, among others,” he explains.
Prime adds that all activities are being implemented in the interest of protecting Sebeya and other catchments where a large percentage of the project cost will be invested to improve the beneficiaries’ welfare and increase their agriculture production.
