DEVELOPMENT OF A RANGER-BASED WATER QUALITY MONITORING PROGRAM FOR PROTECTED AREA MANAGEMENT IN UGANDA:

A case study of Kibale Forest and Ruwenzori Mountains National Parks,

Mid- western Uganda.

A Proposal for Small Grants Initiative, Beahrs Environmental Leadership Program

Prepared by:

Aventino Kasangaki

Senior Field Officer-Ecological Monitoring Program

Institute of Tropical Forest Conservation, Mbarara University of Science & Technology,

P O Box 44 Kabale, Uganda.

Phone: +256-77-709753. Cell phone: +256-77-586873

Email: Kasangaki@itfc.org or aventinok@yahoo.com

Problem statement:

There is an increasing demand for information on which to base management decisions for protected areas (PAs) in Uganda. With increasing human impacts on ecosystems, there is an urgent need for developing monitoring protocols to meet these information needs that are inexpensive using volunteers and or local communities. Monitoring programs in protected areas should be capable of detecting gradual gross changes such as deteriorating water quality as a result of negative changes within the watersheds and also assessing the effectiveness of intervention measures (Sutherland, 2000). Information from monitoring programs will help protected area managers design mitigation measures such as restoration programs where degradation has occurred. Mayfield et al. (2001) assert that the increasing complexity of gathering and using all kinds of environmental information, as well as the decreased funding for these activities, have led to innovations where non-professionals such as local communities and community groups are taking the lead or are cooperating with government agencies to gather such information.

Freshwater biological monitoring and assessment programs using biological indicators of ecological integrity (biocriteria) are integral to successful water resources planning and decision making (Volstad et al. 2003) and ecosystem management (human impacts on the streams include poor agricultural practices on steep sided slopes, loss and destruction of watersheds and inadequate disposal of domestic sewage; these result in poor water quality in streams; establishment and maintenance of buffer strips along river banks and sustainable methods of agriculture such as strip cropping and terracing can help improve water quality). Fore et al (2001) reported that citizen volunteers, when properly trained, could collect reliable data and make stream assessments that are comparable to those made by professionals.

In Uganda’s protected areas, rangers form the majority of park employees. Although they only receive on-the-job training, their work is based primarily in the field. Using rangers (volunteers) to collect water quality data will enable extensive data collection, with little extra cost and thus a larger sample size and spatial coverage (Pettengill-Semmens, 2003 Volstad et al., 2003) and it will offer a highly visible and efficient means to acquire data unobtainable by other means (Turner, 2002). Water quality monitoring has been identified among the monitoring priorities as one of the parameters to monitor in different PAs as per the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) Monitoring and Research Plan. The proposed study/partnership is therefore intended to assist UWA in implementing the Monitoring and Research Plan.

The overall aim of the project is to set up water quality monitoring programs that will inform management decisions, identify priorities for action and provide early warning of future problems. The specific objectives include:

1. Identification of baseline conditions in the stream systems.

2. Detection of any signs of deterioration in water quality.

3. Relating 1 and 2 above to ecosystem condition and assessing the sources of deterioration and elucidating possible remedies.

Project Activities:

The project aims to train rangers in rapid bioassessment protocols for water quality monitoring in two protected areas on a pilot basis. Rangers are fulltime employees of the Uganda Wildlife Authority and as such will provide reliable manpower for the project overtime. We will train rangers in assessing water quality and stream condition using benthic macroinvertebrates and habitat characteristics. Rangers will be trained to use a Surber sampler to collect benthic macroinvertebrates following the established Bwindi Impenetrable National Park Water Quality Monitoring Protocol. They will also be trained to carry out habitat assessments of the sites.

In the laboratory, the rangers will be trained to process the samples including sorting invertebrates from leaves, sticks and sediment; identifying them; and calculating biological metrics. After sorting, the rangers will identify the invertebrates to taxonomic order using pictorial keys. They will be trained to calculate water quality metrics such as total taxon richness, percent composition and richness of the water pollution intolerant groups Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera, and Trichoptera, and the dominance of the assemblage by a single taxon (an indicator of stress). Other metrics will be developed during the course of the program that are especially suitable and sensitive to streams in Uganda.

Collaboration statement:

The project will be implemented in collaboration with Professor Vincent Resh of the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, Division of Insect Biology, at the University of California Berkeley. Vince brings in vast experience on aquatic biomonitoring such as from the Onchocerciasis Control Project in West Africa and the Mekong River in Asia. Vince’s scholarly contributions to benthic ecology, his mentoring influence, as a teacher and advisor, and his global humanitarian work will be valuable to the project. The project will also benefit from the collaboration with the Research and Monitoring Unit of the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) and the Research and Monitoring Wardens located in the protected areas. In particular, I will collaborate with Mr. Charles Tumwesigye, Mr. Nelson Guma, and several research Wardens of UWA. I will further collaborate with Mr. Willy Ghandi Pabire a technician with Fisheries Resources Research Institute (FIRRI) in Uganda. He has a vast experience in identification of benthic macroinvertebrates. He will be available for about one month of project implementation. The UWA research unit will be available throughout project implementation and follow-up as they are responsible for research and monitoring in Uganda’s protected areas.

Connection of project with skills developed during summer certificate course at Berkeley:

I will use the leadership skills gained from the summer certificate course to bring together collaborators in the project. The concept of stakeholder involvement in natural resource management will be valuable in developing the project. More importantly, the project draws from the knowledge gained in the workshop on Rural Communities and Natural Resource Management especially the presentation on Aquatic ecology; Watershed management and Water quality Monitoring. The concept of volunteer monitoring as learnt from this workshop will be tested on Uganda’s protected areas. As I train the rangers, I will use the presentation and facilitation skills sharpened at UC Berkeley.

Expected results and outputs:

The outputs resulting from this project will be:

1. Baseline biological condition of the studied streams and rivers using benthic macroinvertebrates. This will be used to track human impacts in the watersheds

2. Well trained rangers in bio-assessment protocols.

3. Functional water quality monitoring programs for the two protected areas.

4. Findings will form basis for intervention/restoration efforts where degradation has already occurred. The project will provide information on how the quality of water in the streams changes with respect to time as a result of changing human activities in the catchment area and suggest control measures to improve or prevent further deterioration of water quality.

Potential for scaling up:

The project has great potential for being replicated in all protected areas in Uganda and regionally e.g. Rwanda, and DR Congo. Since Ruwenzori National Park is trans-boundary, the program could be extended across the border into DR Congo. In addition, lessons learnt from the project will be used to set up volunteer monitoring projects in Uganda’s streams and rivers outside protected areas. The program has the potential to be used by school groups in non-protected areas of Uganda as well.

Timeline and duration:

The project is expected to officially start in June 2005 and end by June 2006. The project will start with preliminary discussions with collaborators and visits to the proposed project sites so as to prepare a monitoring program document.

1. Stakeholder workshop June 2005 followed by preliminary field visits to locate sampling sites.

2. Training of rangers in Kibale Forest and Ruwenzori Mountains National Parks July 2005 (2 weeks each).

3. Follow up visits to check on progress of project and data quality control August 2005 to April 2006.

4. Project summary and reporting: May 2006. Data analysis and report write up.

Risks associated with proposed project: Past experience in developing volunteer-based programs indicate that the risk of failure is extremely low. Safety training to avoid risks of injury will also be part of the training.

Literature cited:

Fore, L. S., Paulsen, K., & O’Laughlin, K. (2001). Assessing the performance of volunteers in monitoring streams. Freshwater Biology, 46, 109-123.

Mayfield, C., Joliat, M., & Cowan, D. (2001). The roles of community networks in environmental monitoring and environmental informatics. Advances in Environmental Research, 5(4), 385-393.

Pattengill-Semmens, C.V. & Semmens, B.X. (2003). Conservation and management applications of the reef volunteer fish monitoring program. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 81(1-3), 43-50.

Turner, W.R. (2003). Citywide biological monitoring as a tool for ecology and conservation in urban landscapes: the case of the Tucson bird count. Landscape and Urban Planning, 65(3), 149-166.

Volstad, J.H., Neerchal N.K., Roth N.E., and Southerland M.T. (2003). Combining biological indicators of watershed condition from multiple sampling programs - a case study from Maryland, USA. Ecological Indicators, 3(1), 13-25.

Sutherland, W J (2000). The Conservation Handbook: Research, Management and Policy. Blackwell Science Ltd.