Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)

Cage aquaculture is spreading rapidly on AGLs without lake-specific best management practices (BMPs) to ensure long-term socio-economic and environmental sustainability. PESCA project is developing a decision support tool (DST) and BMPs to guide development or improvement of policies and regulations to improve fish production and profitability from cage aquaculture with minimal impacts on the aquatic environment of the AGLs.

Members of this project will host an applied, collaborative workshop which creates lake committees on each of the African Great Lakes. Each lake committee will consist of relevant freshwater experts to harmonize and prioritize research, guide regional research efforts, and facilitate communications between partner countries to positively affect freshwater policy and management using regular in-person meetings, the African Great Lakes Inform, and other relevant means.

The 2017 African Great Lakes Conference, Entebbe, Uganda resolved to advance the African Great Lakes Information Platform (AGLI) (this platform) established by The Nature Conservancy. AGLI was created to promote research and collaboration and support decision-making to ensure the inter-generational sustainability of the lakes and their basins. AGLI will be hosted at the University of Nairobi and managed jointly with the African Center for Aquatic Research and Education. 

African Great Lakes (AGLs) contribute 2.7 million tonnes (~25%) to global inland fisheries production (11.9 mt) annually. This is composed of large species (> 20 cm total length, TL) and small pelagic species (< 20 cm, TL). At the turn of the 20th century, fisheries of the AGLs were dominated by large species (tilapine cichlids, Lates spp, cat fishes, Mormyrids, etc.) and management concentrated on these species.

Thirty-six countries in sub-Saharan Africa have severe shortages of health workers. At least 2.3 trained health care providers are needed per 1,000 people to provide 80 percent of the population with skilled care at birth and child immunisation coverage. Nurses and midwives are on the frontline of health services in Africa. Ensuring that they are provided with the necessary competencies to work and function properly is key in reducing the alarmingly high maternal and mortality rates in Africa.

There has been a lot of discourse throughout the sustainable development goals (SDGs) process on the need for integrated policies that consider the synergies and trade-off across SDGs thematic areas and how that is critical for the achievement of sustainable development. However, most of the discussions have remained in the global policy arena, with less focus on how the integration would be achieved at national policy and program levels.

This project was completed as part of the Conservation Leadership Programme's (CLP) internship program. CLP supports projects that develop the skills of early career conservationists working to conserve the planet's most threatened species and habitats. This project allowed an intern to acquire the skills and knowledge required to be well-positioned to take a lead role in developing the capacities of local communities to sustainably manage and benefit from their natural resources.

The Lake Edward and Lake Albert Basin (LEAB) area in DRC and Uganda is endowed with rich surface water fisheries resources that are important for economic growth and social development in the region. More than 12 million people live in this basin, and 73 percent of them (8.7 million people) depend on fisheries for their livelihoods.

This GIS project was completed as part of the Conservation Leadership Programme's (CLP) internship program. CLP supports projects that develop the skills of early career conservationists working to conserve the planet's most threatened species and habitats. This project focused on developing an intern's skills in geospatial mapping analysis, while also supporting the BirdLife Africa Secretariat in this important area of work.

Integrating women smallholder farmers into the mainstream economy is key in order to increase their productivity, improve the quality of their commodities, gain a voice in decision-making around all aspects of the agriculture value chain and build adaptive capacity to mitigate climate change. NEPAD recognises the impact that climate change will have on African agriculture, especially African women farmers, and designed the five-year Gender, Climate Change and Agriculture Support Project (GCCASP) with support from the Norwegian government.

Over 800 million people are malnourished and the global population is growing, and at the current trend 9 out of 10 children living in poverty in 2030 will be from Sub-Saharan Africa. The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Zero hunger and the SDG Life below water'promote the conservation and sustainable use of aquatic resources for sustainable development.

The fishery activities in Lake Edward are among the major economic activities sustaining livelihoods for the large majority of local communities. In spite of their importance, the conservation and management of critical aquatic habitats is still neglected, leading to alarming rates of decline in fisheries productivity. Growing populations, rapid industrialization and oil exploitation in the region are predicted to exacerbate the pressure on freshwater ecosystems. This requires that appropriate action should be taken for sustainable management of the fishery resources.

This project sought to respond to increased to increased environmental pressures from climate change, and to create and expand incentives to conserve biodiversity and ecosystem services in the South Kivu and Rusizi River cathments.

The transboundary Lake Kivu and Rusizi River basins are very important for biodiversity and provide many ecosystem services such as supply of freshwater, food from fishing and agriculture, pollination, soil fertility and erosion control, carbon sequestering, the provision of non-timber forest products, as well as providing aesthetic and recreation experiences. These landscapes are currently facing a multitude of threats arising from unsustainable practices and poor land and catchment management.

A recent expert review of the ecological risks of net pen aquaculture in the North American Great Lakes made a number of recommendations for Best Management Practices (BMPs) that should be applied to establishment of net pen farms. Based on that_study, researchers identified nine generic BMPs that could be applied to all Global Great Lakes.

Earth system models are the only scientific tools yet developed that are capable of integrating the multitude of physical, chemical and biological processes that determine past, present and future climate. Researchers here use the Community Earth System Model (CESM) to generate depictions of environmental futures under climate change specifically to serve stakeholder needs for each of the major Great Lake watersheds.

This project is empowering local communities to safeguard their unique ecosystems through establishing a coalition of civil society organizations, and strengthening the good governance of transboundary natural resources in order to improve food security and sustainable livelihoods fishery management in Lake Tanganyika. This project also seeks to put in place a trans-boundary oil governance observatory across the African Great lakes including local communities and environmental NGOs.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2014) predicts by the end of this century ~1 4 degrees_C warming and an uncertain trend in future rainfall in the Great Lakes region of East Africa, perhaps 10% lower than present in the Malawi/Nyassa basin and 10% higher in the lake basins to the north. Radar altimetry records of lake level trends available since 1992 display decadal scale variability of 1-2 m, with an overall trend in the last decade towards lower levels in Lakes Malawi/Nyassa and Rukwa, and higher levels in the lakes to the north of Rukwa.

The United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development accepts the formidable challenge of integrating historically siloed, economic, social, and environmental goals into a unified plan of action for people, planet, and prosperity. While small-scale fisheries in marine systems were given their target as part of SDG14: Life below water, at first sight the SDGs appear to ignore inland fisheries.