Promoting Green Urban Development in African Cities : Kampala, Uganda, Urban Environmental Profile

The city of Kampala has undergone a period of rapid urbanization that has contributed to the degradation of the city's natural environment. The urban environmental profile for Kampala has been prepared as the first component of the assignment promoting green urban development in Africa: enhancing the relationship between urbanization, environmental assets, and ecosystem services, a project being conducted under the leadership of the World Bank. An overall objective of this project is to link the study of urban environmental issues with the advancement of more sustainable urban growth. The profile summarizes the existing quality of the wetlands and other aquatic and terrestrial environmental assets, identifies the key drivers that are the cause of their vulnerability, and describes the key institutional challenges and constraining factors that limit the city's ability to address environmental management challenges. Identification of the key environmental assets and key drivers of environmental degradation within the city required a more comprehensive review of reports on urban planning and infrastructure services. The city has recently made progress in the development of key infrastructure systems such as solid waste management and sanitation. The report is organized as follows: section one gives introduction. Section two sets the background and context for Kampala, providing an overview of the impacts of rapid urbanization and climate change, drawing linkages to urban environmental assets. Section three, quality of the environmental assets of Kampala describes the state of the key environmental assets, including the terrestrial assets, aquatic assets, and air quality, and attempts to infer the associated historic and current trends. Section four, drivers of environmental vulnerability and degradation describes the key issues that are driving degradation and the impacts caused. Section five, institutional issues and challenges describes the key factors that constrain Kampala's ability to effectively address environmental management challenges. Section six, provides a synthesis of key findings