Restore the Pololeti River

A women- and youth-led, 5-year community project to bring back the river the Serengeti ecosystem cannot live without.

Why it matters

From sacred Maasai springs to Lake Victoria.

The Pololeti rises at Entamejoi — a sacred place of Maasai Laitayok ritual — and flows through six villages, eventually feeding Lake Victoria via the wider Mara-Serengeti ecosystem.

Humans, wildlife, livestock and birds across the entire region depend on this river. If it disappears — predicted to happen without urgent action — thousands of lives are at risk.

We aim to begin a community project led by women and youth to restore the Pololeti River, to begin with, to better healthy rangeland.

Humans, wildlife, livestock, and birds depend on water for survival. Villages such as Mondorosi, Sukenya, Soitsambu, Orkuyeine, Kirtalo, and Oloipiri, and the whole Serengeti ecosystems depend on water from the Pololeti River.
The Pololeti River and Wasso River are under evident pressure from dual threats of climate change and human overuse. As Noloramata director, I have seen it with my own eyes, during the increasingly severe droughts Pololeti river dries up toward its sources in ‘ENTAMEJOI’, a place where it is a sacred place for ‘Maasai Laitayok’ ritual places, Moraani hoods, and the elderly hood. The erosion of its bank in mounting flash floods, which sweeps all the acacia trees.
Overgrazing and an increase in farm land towards the river banks, illegal sand harvesting, and logging along the river cause further erosion and reduced water levels, and these are being lost (THESE ARE THE THREATS NOT JUST WITHIN THE MENTIONED COMMUNITY, but far beyond these borders)

Pololeti River is a part of the great Maasai Mara Serengeti ecosystems, and it feeds and flows to Lake Victoria. If the Pololeti River disappears (predicted to happen unless immediate major action is taken thousands of people, livestock, and wildlife will lose their lives.

POLOLETI RIVER RESTORATIONS PROJECTS

Our immediate goals are:

Planting 1,000,000 (Vachellia xanthophloea) seedling trees along all sources in the river in five years plan.
Discouraging farm land increase in Loiswash sub village in Oloipiri village and trying to minimize the existing one through village land use plans by laws, in which 800 to 1000 meters from the river bank, there will be no human activities involved.
Reducing or eliminating sand harvesting along the river banks.
Eliminating illegal logging along the river flows and the surrounding.

KEY PROJECT COMPONENTS

Reforestation of the river banks

To prevent more erosion along the river, the first step is replanting the trees(Vachellia xanthophloea) which is the dominant indigenous tree along the river bank and makes the plots where fencing will be done to avoid stepping of animals and people, and stores moisture for at least one year.
The indigenous tree, such as acacia, will be planted where students, both in secondary and primary schools, e.g., Soitsambu secondary school students and primary school students, and women can be engaged as part of introducing environmental conservation clubs in schools, youths, and women groups.

Eliminating logging and sand harvesting along the river

These illegal activities contribute to the erosion and flooding of the river, so our effort to increase local engagement and participation is a critical long-term solution. Village bylaws developed through village council land use plans, traditional penalty and employment of village scouts(VGs) will be the solutions to this problem. The work of the Villages scouts is to patrol those areas and inform the authorities.

Eliminating Farm (Agriculture) along the river

By empowering villages councils and traditional leaders through sustainable land use plans, By- laws will be adopting in such a way that will discourages the increase of agricultural activities along the river it may be 800-1000metres from the river bank where no any human economic activities will be operating and the compensations might applied for those existing farms, by doing so Pololeti river will serve the presence generations and the future coming generations, Also the water drinking points will be established based on the past water point before the river eroded, the reference of 10 to 20 years ago might be applied.

“If the Pololeti River disappears, thousands of people, livestock, and wildlife will lose their lives.”

Led by women and youth, our restoration project combines reforestation, by-law enforcement, and citizen science to give the river — and everyone who depends on it — a future.