Rwanda Environment Management Authority (REMA) has earmarked Rwf1.1bn to rehabilitate selected degraded lakeshores around the country.

The exercise will be conducted under the organisation’s Decentralisation Environmental Management Project (DEMP).

Speaking to The New Times, the project’s technical advisor, Alphonsine Ntabana revealed that so far US$2m has been earmarked for the clean-up of the lakeshores, starting with Lake Muhazi in Kayonza, Eastern Province.

"We have already started digging trenches on Lake Muhazi and will start planting trees during the tree planting week,” she said.

Rehabilitation of Lake Kivu in the Western Province was completed and mid this year work on Lake Muhazi was commissioned while Lake Mugesera is in the pipeline.

The rehabilitation that started in 2005 aims at implementing the organic law of environment that stipulates that lake shores should be 50 metres. 

The key objectives of the project include; integrating environment with development and promoting sustainable livelihoods using decentralisation as a mechanism.

Ntabana said that the lake shores chosen for rehabilitation are characterized by human pressures that cause soil erosion, raise in water levels because of the silt in the lakes resulting into floods.

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