CSOs demand more funding for environmental activities

The Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) have asked the government to operationalise the environment levy fund and provide more resources to protect the environment and fight climate change.
The demand is contained in the CSOs position paper on the ministerial policy statement for 2023/2024 Financial Year that was released last week.
According to the proposed budget, the sector has been allocated Shs3.1 trillion, of which Shs1.7 trillion is on-budget while Shs1.3 trillion is off budget/appropriation in aid.
The Ministry of Water and Environment has been allocate Shs1.5 trillion, while National Environmental Management Authority (Nema) was allocated a paltry Shs18.9 billion. The National Forestry Authority (NFA) has Shs29.2 billion, Uganda National Meteorological Authority (UNMA) Shs17.7 billion, while local governments have been allocated Shs94.8 billion to cater for the natural resources sector, Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) was give Shs20.6 billion while Shs1.3 trillion goes to National Water and Sewerage Corporation.
The civil society organisations now say the funds allocated to the sector are not enough, especially for environmental protection and fighting climate change.
The government, according to the Ministerial Policy Statement for 2023/2024 provided Shs20 billion for the restoration of the environment through tree planting for raising tree seedlings, while an additional Shs10 billion has been provided for unpaid certificates for seedlings already supplied.
According to the budget framework paper for 2023/2024, there is a funding gap of Shs1.5 billion that has partly limited NFA from fulfilling its mandate of resurveying and demarcating the encroached forest land.
CSOs now say this has exacerbated the giveaway of some forest land such as Bugoma forest reserve to private entities of Hoima Sugar Ltd and MZ Agencies for sugarcane growing
“We recommend that; Much as the government has proposed to allocate Shs30b, specifically for the restoration of the environment through tree planting, additional funding should be allocated to strengthen other climate change interventions country wide. The government through the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MFPED) allocates additional Shs1.5b to effectively conduct a resurvey and demarcate the encroached forest land,” the CSOs said.
The group has also asked the government to operationalise the environmental levy fund, which has been shelved since 2019. The National Environment Act, 2019 provides for the establishment of the National Environment Fund.
The fund is generated from environmental levies, fees charged for the use of resources, fines, gifts, donations and other voluntary contributions meant to support restoration activities.
“However, we are concerned that as per the Section 32(2) of the National Environment Act, the Fund has not been fully operationalised to carry out the activities for which the fund was established,” the statement from the civil society organisation further states.
The CSOs also asked the Ministry of Water and Wnvironment, Nema and the Finance ministry to fast track the operationalization of the National Environment Fund as approved by the cabinet.
On land administration, the CSOs noted that the activities are underfunded. For example, in 2022/2023 Financial Year, while the Lands ministry asked for Shs6.8 billion to strengthening the capacity of land administrators, only Shs1.8 billion was provided, leaving a huge funding gap of Shs5 billion
They asked the government to increase allocation to build capacity of land administration structures from Shs6.7 billion to Shs13.6 billion.
“A percentage of the non-tax revenue generated from land registration be retained at the district to finance the operations of the Area Land Committees and District Land Boards for remuneration and retooling,” part of the recommendation reads.
Underfunding
Data from the Uganda National Meteorological Authority indicate that the entity has a funding gap of Shs26.3 billion, which it needs to run its operations. For example, while the authority has 58 automatic weather stations, 38 manual weather stations, and 80 rainfall stations to transmit data from the field station to the headquarters, the authority still faces challenges such as inadequate weather monitoring equipment, inadequate computational facilities, inadequate personnel as well as insufficient funding for dissemination.
The CSOs say UNMA relies more on television broadcasts, print media and occasionally social media to disseminate weather information which are not easily accessible to many farmers, especially in the rural areas of the country and that local governments lack designated persons to disseminate the weather information from UNMA.
"We recommend that the government allocates additional funding to strengthen the operations of UNMA for improved services such as early warning signs, aviation transport advisory, and marine transport guides and government should consider enhancing the capacities of local personnel such as district and sub- county agricultural or environmental officers to take on the task of disseminating the information at the community level in appropriate local dialects,” they said.
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