" Nema goes after 29 major polluters of Nairobi River" 01 February 2024

The National Environment Management Authority has tasked 29 companies to clean up their mess from the environment. The order has bolstered the ongoing efforts to clean up the heavily polluted Nairobi River basin. Nema gave the directive following the companies' failure to comply with extended producer responsibility as per the provisions of the Sustainable Waste Management Act 2022.

The Act, enacted on July 6, 2022, has provisions known as extended producer responsibility that hold producers responsible for polluting the environment. This is a departure from the past, when public members were solely held responsible for littering. The restoration order came after Nema officers carried out inspections on various points within the Nairobi River catchment on January 18. “The inspection team established that there were assorted synthetic wastes along the Ngong River (Likoni area) and Nairobi River (Rounder area-Outer Ring Road), part of which bore your identity as a producer,” said Nema director general Mamo Mamo, in a restoration order to the Director of Brookside, dated January 22.

He said the company waste that had accumulated in the rivers, interfered with water flow and posed a potential threat of flooding and water pollution. “This is likely to have adverse environmental effects on the sensitive Nairobi River ecosystem,” Mamo said. The Constitution of Kenya 2010 lists environment as a right and fundamental freedom under Article 42 and provides that every person has a right to a clean and healthy environment.

Section 13 (1) of the Sustainable Waste Management Act, 2022, requires every producer to reduce pollution and environmental impacts of the products they introduce into the Kenyan market and waste arising therefrom.

“Section 30 (1) states that a person who fails to manage waste in accordance with this Act shall be required to clean up and restore the site, where the waste was being managed to its natural state,” Mamo said.

“Section 32 states that a person who contravenes a provision of this Act for which a penalty has not been prescribed shall, on conviction, be liable to a fine of not less than Sh2 million and not more than Sh4 million or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding four years or both.”