“It will be a desert”: Extreme weather and the effects of climate catastrophe on vulnerable riparian spaces in Nairobi, Kenya

Abstract (English)

Urban riparian spaces are notoriously vulnerable, and pressure on water resources is
growing. In the context of a fast-growing urban population and a lack of state-level structures
and services to deal with water and sanitation, these spaces—including both land and water—are
rapidly being degraded. Ongata Rongai, a satellite town in the Nairobi Metropolitan Area, is one of
these spaces. Traditional livelihoods exist cheek-by-jowl with modern life; livestock are watered at
the rivers, lions frequent the riverbanks, large commercial farms extract water for crops, industrial
factories release heavy metal contaminants into the rivers, and rapidly constructed poor-quality
apartment blocks with no provision for human waste release untreated sewage and dump trash into
the rivers. Compounding these anthropogenic impacts is that of climate change. Riparian spaces
have become sites where humans and animals fight for access to water and riparian space, and
rain becomes less reliable or frequent, yet at other times, these spaces experience flash flooding
and catastrophic water levels leading to the destruction of land. This study explores the dynamics
of a rapidly changing riparian environment which finds itself dominated by urbanity, under the
increasing pressure of anthropogenic climate change using a One Health perspective. This study
contributes much needed human voices to a growing body of literature led by indigenous Kenyan
scholars, calling for urgent structural level action to conserve urban riparian zones for the benefit of
human and non-human actors.