National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan 2002.

To address these practices which lead to biodiversity loss, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) calls upon countries to develop national strategies, plans or programmes for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity. Countries are also urged to integrate, as far as possible, the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity into relevant sectoral or cross-sectoral plans, programmes and policies. In order to meet these obligations, the Government of Uganda has prepared this National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP) to provide a framework to guide the setting of conservation priorities, channeling of investments and building of the necessary capacity for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity in the country.
The overall vision of Uganda’s NBSAP is to maintain a rich biodiversity benefiting the present and future generations for national development.
The goal of the NBSAP is to enhance biodiversity conservation, management and sustainable utilisation and fair sharing of the benefits arising from such utilisation at all levels.
In order to achieve this goal, five strategic objectives were identified; namely: (i) to develop and strengthen co-ordination, measures and frameworks for biodiversity management, (ii) to facilitate research, information management and information exchange on biodiversity, (iii) to reduce and manage negative impacts on biodiversity, (iv) to promote the sustainable use and a fair sharing of costs and benefits of biodiversity, (v) to enhance awareness on biodiversity issues among the various stakeholders.
In order to make agriculture, forestry and fisheries more productive and sustainable, the strategy plans to improve water availability and management for improved livestock production, and to develop and promote appropriate farming methods.
To increase the resilience of livelihood to disasters, a number of key strategies will be implemented by the strategy in order to develop and strengthen co-ordination, measures and frameworks for biodiversity management: (i) strengthen biodiversity management outside protected areas, (ii) undertake Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA) of policies, (iii) programmes or projects which are likely to have significantly negative impacts on biodiversity inside and outside protected areas, (iv) strengthen the role of communities and other stakeholders in biodiversity management, (v) establish standards to pollution and waste discharge in wetlands, (vi) promote public education on wetlands in educational institutions, (vii) develop strategies for managing biodiversity in local forest reserves, (viii) develop mechanisms for sharing costs and benefits of forestry resources, (ix) promote integration of wildlife resource values into macroeconomic frameworks, (x) develop and implement informal public education and awareness on soil biodiversity.
In the context of governance, NEMA will be responsible for the over-all co-ordination of the implementation of this NBSAP. The specific role of NEMA will involve supervising the implementation of the general measures as well as overseeing and co-coordinating the implementation of various strategies and actions by the sectoral agencies. To enable NEMA fulfill this role, there is going to be a very strong need for inter-sectoral collaboration to avoid duplication. NEMA will also put in place a clear mechanism for fulfilling its role of coordination, supervision and monitoring.