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{
    "id": 774138,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/774138/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 269,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Madam Temporary Speaker, the other issue is that we may not be able to separate the irrigation from the environment. As we move around the country, especially in Kirinyaga, you can see farming being encouraged in riparian areas. Currently, the water catchment areas – the riparian areas – are being utilised for cultivation. This is because that is their only area where probably, crops are growing throughout the year. So, as we look at the Bill, the authority should be able to discourage cultivation in the riparian areas and be able to give water for irrigation to the people who are cultivating those areas. The other issue is that there is a lot of abstraction of water from the rivers. We have a situation somewhere in Kirinyaga where within a span of less than five kilometres in one river, you have over 15 intakes. These intakes are being developed by the communities because they want potable and shallow water for irrigation. This authority should be able to take care of that because over-abstraction of those rivers is making them dry over a period of time. Madam Temporary Speaker, on the other issue, if you look at India in terms of enriching the aquifers, they do percolations. They dig holes during the rainy seasons so that the aquifers are enriched. I believe the authority should be able to ensure that there are regulations that will make sure that we dig holes in certain areas, especially where we have water flowing very fast so that we can enrich our aquifers. By doing this, we will be able to have aquifers which are rich because we may not always have water to irrigate. Most of the times we may be forced to dig boreholes. If we enrich aquifers, we will not be digging deeper to be able to get water. Finally, I would want to say that given that Kirinyaga is one of the areas where we produce a lot of rice for this country, the authority should come up and look at the regulations that have been imposed by the NIB. Those regulations are very punitive and they make people in Mwea to live in abject poverty. Therefore, we need an enabling authority; we do not have to get an authority that comes and starts discriminating or making people poorer or disadvantaged. We need to look at the issue of issuing title deeds to the farmers of Mwea. These farmers have been farming rice without title deeds and they cannot use the farms as collateral and be able to farm well. Madam Temporary Speaker, with those few remarks, I whole heartedly support the Bill."
}