Decision 40 COM 7B.80

Lake Turkana National Parks (Kenya) (N 801bis)

The World Heritage Committee,

1. Having examined Document WHC/16/40.COM/7B.Add,
2. Recalling Decision 39 COM 7B.4, adopted at its 39th session (Bonn, 2015),
3. Regrets that no response was provided by the States Parties of Kenya and Ethiopia to the recommendations from the 2015 mission and notes with utmost concern that no update is provided on the status of the Kuraz Sugar Scheme, as well as the impounding of the Gibe III reservoir and the measures taken to mitigate the impacts thereof on the property;
4. Regretting that progress with preparing the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) has been limited to the development of draft Terms of Reference (ToR), notes with concern that these do not appear to foresee the inclusion of development projects that may have an indirect or cumulative impact on the Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) of the property, and urges the States Parties of Kenya and Ethiopia to revise the ToR, in consultation with the World Heritage Centre, IUCN and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and to ensure that the SEA will be undertaken to accepted international standards and in accordance with IUCN’s World Heritage Advice Note on Environmental Assessment, to enable identification of mitigation measures and the least damaging and most sustainable alternatives for all developments impacting on the Lake Turkana basin;
5. Requests the States Parties of Kenya and Ethiopia to ensure that an international bidding process is undertaken on the basis of the revised ToR to recruit an independent firm to undertake the SEA, and to submit the report of the Scoping Study for the SEA to the World Heritage Centre for review by IUCN, as soon as it is available, and no later than 1 February 2017;
6. Also requests the World Heritage Centre and UNEP to work effectively with the States Parties of Kenya and Ethiopia and IUCN on the joint UNEP-supported Ethiopia-Kenya project for the sustainable development in Lake Turkana and its basins, in order to support the two States Parties in the implementation of the requests made by the Committee, including in relation to the SEA, and to ensure an active consideration of the Committee’s concerns in UNEP’s work;
7. Further requests the States Parties of Kenya and Ethiopia to provide more details on the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for a “Cross-border Integrated Programme for Sustainable Peace and Socio-economic Transformation” and to ensure adequate water flow from the Omo River to maintain the OUV of the property, and to integrate the findings from the SEA into the cross-border programme;
8. Notes the establishment of a joint expert panel for monitoring basin-wide natural resource management under the existing Ethiopia-Kenya Joint Ministerial Commission, and requests furthermore the States Parties to provide further details on the terms of reference of this commission and the joint expert panel;
9. Also regrets that no wildlife census has been conducted or planned to establish baseline data of key wildlife species in the property, and reiterates its request to the State Party of Kenya to urgently implement all of the outstanding recommendations of the 2012 mission;
10. Requests moreover the State Party to submit to the World Heritage Centre, by 1 February 2017, a report on progress achieved with the implementation of the 2015 mission recommendations and with the SEA, and on the status of impounding of the Gibe III hydroelectric dam, the proposed expansion of the Kuraz Sugar Scheme and any other developments that may have the potential to impact the OUV of the property, including oil exploration and the Lake Turkana Wind Farm project in Kenya, and to submit by 1 December 2017, an updated report on the state of conservation of the property and the implementation of the above, for examination by the World Heritage Committee at its 42nd session in 2018.