Lake Chad Basin: benefit-sharing preoccupy stakeholders

The Lake Chad Basin is the largest continental basin slope in Africa, though it now faces several environmental challenges that threaten its sustainability.

As a result, the equitable sharing of the lake’s resources has become a tall order. It is for this reason that the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, IUCN, in partnership with the Lake Chad Basin Commission, LCBC and BRIDGE Africa, organised a three-day workshop to drill different stakeholders on good practices.

The Douala event assembled participants from LCBC member countries, National Platforms of Cameroon and Chad, Trans-boundary Platform of the Chari-Logone Basin, LCBC and Volta Basin Authority representatives, and partners. They learnt techniques of good governance and equitable benefit-sharing of water resources from the lake.

To ensure realistic and equitable use of water and benefit-sharing, the representative of LCBC, Aminu Magaji Bala, said a legal framework and the International Water Law taught at the workshop will spell out the criteria for benefit-sharing.

Camille Flore Jepang Sandjong of IUCN said though the state of the lake was still preoccupying, the water level has been stable for some time, though not yet enough for the over 30 million people whose livelihoods depend on it.