LTA Project News

Initied by UN-Habitat, the Lake Tanganyika - Water, Sanitation and Environmental Management Project (LT-WATSAN Project) will take full advantage of experiences and lessons learnt from Lake Victoria - WATSAN under UN-HABITAT, indicated Mr. Robert GOODWIN, Chief LV Section WATSAN / UN HABITAT.

The association Greenbelt Action for Environment (ACVE) and Lake Tanganyika Authority (LTA), in collaboration with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), UNOPS, and the UNDP/GEF Project, organised, on Thursday May 3 rd , a workshop on biological control of invasive plants affecting the Lake Tanganyika ecosystem in Burundi.

However, recent events on the global stage, particularly in regard to the number of food riots that occurred during 2008, even at a time of record harvests, have prompted additional interest in those factors, including invasive species, which could, through climatic uncertainty, alter food production.

Barcoding and phylogenetic data from Lake Tanganyika endemics indicate multiple invasions and unsettle existing taxonomy. Therefore, we reject the hypothesis of monophyly for the sponges from Lake Tanganyika and challenge existing higher taxonomic structure for freshwater sponges.

Standard MODIS Aqua Ocean Color products were found to not provide a suitable calibration for high altitude lakes such as the Lake Tanganyika. Our results show that for the geographical, atmospheric and optical conditions of Lake Tanganyika: (i) a coastal aerosol model set with high relative humidity (90%) provides a suitable atmospheric correction; A comparison between surface chlorophyll-a concentrations estimated from field monitoring and from the MODIS based dataset shows that remote sensing allows improved detection of surface blooms in Lake Tanganyika.

Climate warming over the 20th century has increased the density stratification and stability of Lake Tanganyika, a deep rift valley lake. While lakes in general will increase heat outputs in a warming climate, heat outputs will increase more slowly in deeper lakes than in shallower lakes.

On 22nd March 2012, Burundi celebrated the World Water Day under the theme “Water in sufficient quality and quantity: source of life”. Related ceremonies took place in Kirundo Province, Busoni commune, in the zone of Gisenyi at Rwibikara, near Lake Cohoha.

The Parliament recently adopted the first Burundi Water Code, a general law providing the standards, the guiding principles in the sector and the legal and institutional frame of water sector, to enable the good governance of potable water services for Burundian population and sustainable management of water resources in the country.

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The fifth meeting of the Lake Tanganyika Authority (LTA) Management Committee took place at Lake Tanganyika Hotel, Kigoma, Tanzania from 26 th to 28 th February 2012. The meeting was attended by Management Committee members from the four Lake Tanganyika riparian countries of the Republic of Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the United Republic of Tanzania and the Republic of Zambia. He expressed gratitude of the Government and the people of the United Republic of Tanzania for the honour of hosting the fifth ordinary meeting of the LTA Management Committee and the forthcoming fifth ordinary meeting of the Conference of the Ministers.

The LTA Executive Director, Dr Henry MWIMA and LTA Director of Environment, Mr. Gabriel HAKIZIMANA received in audience by HE Second Vice - President of Republic of Burundi, Mr. Gervais RUFYKIRI on this Thursday, 23rd February, 2012.

A workshop on the Draft Lake Tanganyika Regional Integrated Environmental Monitoring Programme (LTRIEMP) was opened at Bujumbura on this Thursday, 16th February 2012, by the Executive Director of Lake Tanganyika Authority, Dr Henry Mwima.

In fact, a recent survey conducted by Nature Conservancy social scientists concluded that 95% of GME households earn income from farming. Rapidly growing village populations are left with little choice but to expand their settlements and farms into the wild lands and clear forest and woodland for agriculture, fuel and timber. Steep hillsides are haphazardly farmed and the run-off, heavy with sediment, fills coastal zones and pushes near-shore fishery production—the source of 40% of the protein for local families—into decline.

http://www.independent.co.ug/rwanda-ed/rwanda/5042-unlocking-a-regional-resource

EAC Summit Chairperson urges investors to take advantage of basin’s vast potential as 1st Lake Tanganyika Basin Development Conference opens.

Seventh Great Lakes of the World Conference (GLOW VII) will be organized by the Lake Tanganyika Authority (LTA) and the Aquatic Ecosystem Health and Management Society, Canada in Bujumbura, Burundi on April 29 to May 2, 2012.

The Lake Tanganyika Basin Development Conference will take place in Bujumbura, Burundi, from 28th to 29th November, 2011.

Mimosa pigra is an invasive species in many places in Africa and is spreading.