Abdirizak Arale Nunow

The Tana delta is within the Tana Delta District that was curved out in 2007 from the larger Tana River District in Coast province. The district headquarters is situated in Garsen and the delta is a common use area for the communities inhabiting the area. The delta is named after the Tana River, the largest river in Kenya that stretches over a total length of 1,000 km. The river originates from Mt. Kenya and Aberdares ranges in central Kenya and has a catchment area of about 95,000 Km

Large tracts of land within the Tana Delta have been set aside for large industrial scale farming and for mining by government and private agencies, as well as by foreign governments. In addition, settlement schemes have taken up some of the most important dry season pastures within the Tana delta and communities from outside the pastoral areas were settled there to undertake crop farming. The delta is therefore under unprecedented threat as corporations and foreign agencies scramble to exploit its riches for export crops, bio-fuels and minerals. While the delta provides immense environmental services to the country, developments that do not take the special circumstances of the delta into consideration may lead to the collapse of most of its services.

This study examines the various land deals in the delta and the actors involved. The terms of such concessions and their political manifestations are critically reviewed. In order to understand the dynamics of the land deals in the Tana delta, it is important to identify the justifying arguments being put forward by the proponents with a view to interrogating their plausibility, and giving a glimpse of what the future direction might be with regard to such deals, particularly in such a fragile ecosystem as the Tana delta.

Among the prominent land deals in the delta are the plans by the Tana Athi River Development Authority, TARDA, (a government agency), and the largest sugar company in Kenya, the Mumias Sugar Company, to convert about 40,000 ha of the delta into a monoculture sugar cane plantation. The Kenya Government has already given tenure rights and ownership of the 40,000 ha of delta land to TARDA, ostensibly to grow rice and maize as a response to Kenya’s recent droughts and food shortage. Unfortunately, more than 25,000 people living in 30 villages will be evicted from their ancestral land that has now been given to TARDA.

Other land deals of significant concern within the delta and its immediate neighborhood include: Bedford Bio-fuels Inc, a privately held multinational company based in Canada, to acquire 90,000 ha of land through 45-year lease agreement, to grow jatropha curcas; Tiomin Kenya Ltd, a company incorporated in Canada, to mine titanium in the delta; another sugar company, Mat International, to acquire 120,000 ha of land in Tana delta and adjacent districts, and Qatar intends to lease from the Kenya government about 40,000 ha of land in delta to grow food crops, in exchange for supporting a major new port in nearby Lamu town. These and other acquisitions of smaller magnitudes in the delta are central to this study.