Groundwater Risks and Institutional Responses for Poverty Reduction in Rural Africa

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Improved understanding of groundwater risks and institutional responses against competing growth and development goals is central to accelerating and sustaining Africa's development. Irrigated agriculture, mining and tourism all provide pathways out of poverty but create unprecedented demands on complex and poorly understood groundwater systems. Kwale County on the south eastern coast of Kenya characterises the prospects and limits for new and competing groundwater use with Kenya's largest mine beginning production in 2014. The mineral sands mine has a peak groundwater abstraction of 5,400 m3 per day from a spatially-distribution borefield site to act as a buffer to surface water storage deficits in drought events. Conjunctive surface and groundwater resources are critical to ensure a revenue stream of USD250 million per year over 13 years of the mine's operation, which will elevate minerals to be the Kenya's fourth largest foreign exchange generator. The Kwale coastal aquifer system also irrigates 5,000 hectares of sugarcane managed by Kwale International Sugarcane Company (KISCOL). Other groundwater users include a thriving tourism industry, a small municipality and thousands of handpump water users. Thus, Kwale captures the complex reality of Africa's groundwater science and policy challenges at a unique historical moment prior to a generation of social, environmental and economic change. The aim of the project is to characterise biophysical and socio-economic dimensions of groundwater risk to inform improved institutional responses to promote growth and poverty reduction in Kenya.