EU Energy Policy Driving agrofuels land grabs in Kenya David Barissa Team Leader, AAIK, Coast Region
About Kenya in brief • Has a population of about 40M people (2009, census) • Over 50% living below the poverty line • 11M people hungry, without food, over 5M children face malnutrition • Net food importer • Faced with recurrent drought and famine, occasioning calls for humanitarian support
Drivers and Main proponents MAIN DRIVERS • Energy crisis and renewable targets • Food crisis • Financial crisis WHO ARE THE MAIN PROPONENTS? • Asian powers seeking to secure food supply • Oil-rich (but land and water poor) Gulf States • European and North American banks, financiers and sovereign funds, investing in land (responding to financial crisis) • European and North American companies responding to policy targets • All the above in partnerships with African governments and/or domestic partners craving for FDI
Two essential problems 1) Insecure local user rights: Local/national lack of protection 2) Biofuel craze/boom : EU 10% target and lacking available land in North
Environmental impacts • Clearing of forests / felling of trees • Pollution arising from use of agro- chemicals • Loss of biodiversity especially for endemic species (flora and fauna)
Grabbing of agricultural lands • Displacement of mainstream food production • Depletion of water resources • Breeding conflicts between communities due to shrinking resources amidst growing population
Examples of Land grabs Company Size and terms Leasers Uses Impacts Bedford 90,000ha, 45yrs County council Jatropha Loss of biodiversity, conflicts, Biofuels inc. of Tana River curcas displaced livelihoods (Canada) Kenya Jatropha 50,000ha, 33yrs, County council Jatropha 20,000 people at risk of Energy ltd @2 Euros/ha of Malindi Curcas displacement, environmental (Italy) destruction, water depletion, displaced food production Nile Trading 600,000ha, to District council, Timber, Loss of agricultural land, forest Co. (USA) expand to 1M, 40 South Sudan Biofuel (palm destruction, displacement yrs oil & jatropha MaLIBYA 100,000ha, 50yrs, Maliyan Rice, cattle, No compensation, no loss of land for free, 30 yrs tax President, Head other food for small holder farmers/livestock exemption of state, Libya crops keepers Qatar Govt 40,000ha, 30 yrs GoK Horticultural Displaced livehoods, water crops depletion, loss of b/diversity
Recent conflicts in the Tana Delta • Over 120 people dead • Thousands of livestock slashed • Houses, schools, food crops and other property worth millions destroyed • Land grab at the origin Jamal is an 8yr old girl who survived the clashes
Police wander around the torched houses
Human rights violations • Violation of the right to food • Forced displacement, no compensation, no alternative land • Right to participation and right to self determination • Right to worship (graves, sacred forests…)
The Dakatcha Case
Make way for The wonder crop!! • 50,000ha of community trust land leased to Kenya Jatropha energy ltd by County council, for 33yrs @ Ksh 200 (2euros) per ha p.a • About 20,000 people displaced • Destruction of the indigenous forest and water sources
The proponents NIISrL, (Iniziative Industriali Nouve Sri), an Italian company planning to exporting biofuels from Kenya to EU, including palm oil from Côte d'Ivoire and Malaysia.
Our Intervention…. • Community mobilization, and empowerment • Memoranda and petitions to ministers and NEMA • Urgent appeal to Minister: 3000 emails, 2000 hard copies of appeal signed and sent with support from Peuples Solidaires in France • Research and launch of a study on life cycle of Jatropha that sought to challenge the viability of the KJEs proposal from a technical perspective. • Filed a Court case • Organized demonstrations / public stunts
Interventions cont… • Hosted a team of 10 journalists to highlight the case. • Visited the EU parliament to lobby European decision makers and journalists . • A lunch time debate with EU members of parliament, hosted by Linda McAvan
Outcome • Environmental impact assessment conducted and shared • Two directors have so far been suspended from NEMA following illegal issue of certificates to firms in Coast, while NEMA also slapped a ban on growing of Jatropha in the entire coast province. (see the video http://www.youtube.com/v/NUuDlRC6aF8& autoplay=1&rel=0). • Project stopped completely, withdrawal of investor
Agitated village elders in the Dakatcha woodland….
We want Food…not Jatropha!
Conclusions 1) At the root of the problem is both local governance and EU policy 2) Replacing food with energy crops is a luxury we cannot afford 3) EU can help solve the problem by adapting energy policy so that peoples rights are no longer violated
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