Environmental and Social Impact Assessment - Gibe III

Gibe III – Environmental and Social Impact Assessment 300 ENV R CS 002 C - A9003099
13 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
13.1 Conclusions
The key potentially beneficial impacts associated with implementation of the Gibe III Project are related to
the post-construction phase and include: power generation at low CO2- emission rates (i.e. 90.000 t/y
compared with 4.500.000 t/y which an equivalent thermo power plant produces), prospects to export power,
rural electrification, regulation of the river flow for irrigation, and local income-generation during
construction, etc. The creation of additional water bodies would also have a positive effect by significantly
increasing the fishery potential in the reservoir area. Besides the above, major benefits would be induced by
the regulation of the river flow in the downstream lower Omo River valley in terms of public health
(reduction of water logging that would facilitate the control of malaria, tripanosomiasis and other waterborne
diseases).
The presence of Gibe III reservoir will provide flood protection (will reduce floods both in peak and in
frequency) to downstream areas. As a result, the damage due to floods like loss of crops, dwellings and the
suffering and possibly death of affected people will reduce. Safety and infrastructure protection from floods
(the 2006’ floods have caused in the area hundreds people and thousand animals dead besides 15,000
displaced population, with an estimate of over 17 million US$ of works needed for rehabilitation). With this
regulation, areas prone to frequent flooding can be used for agricultural purposes.
The regulation of the flow will also make the river navigable all year round. Besides its leisure time use, the
possibility of a water route could also involve new commercial relationship between villages and inhabited
zones and all the way to Lake Turkana in Kenya which are currently separated from great distance or
difficult connections, eventually permitting the improvement of the economical life of the interested
Weredas. This will be a shorter and most likely cheaper route for export of agricultural product and livestock
in the region. This is considered like an interesting tourism activities by the National Park Authorities,
related to foreign and local people spare time.
Several of the potential adverse environmental impacts will be short-term because they stem from ground
disturbance, operation of equipment and housing of the labour force during construction therefore impacts
could be controlled within acceptable limits, provided that appropriate mitigation and compensation
measures are adopted. There are, however, a number of unavoidable aspects of project implementation and
operation, which will have some adverse impacts and related to reservoir impounding, land take requirement
to accommodate the different project facilities and change in the river flow, i.e.:
• Creation of the reservoir would result in the loss of some 17,158 ha of woodland on the hillslopes of
the valley and 1,839 ha of narrow riparian vegetation along the river and streams;
• The project (reservoir, EEPCO’s permanent camp and the Chida-Sodo road realignment) will affect
a total of 355 households, about 188.94 ha of privately owned land of which 138.7 ha is farmland, 47
residential housing units and 71,852 perennial crops and other trees;
• The historical sites known as King Ijajo Kella and King Halala Walls will be partially affected by the
reservoir. The sections that will be flooded are less than 2% of the total lengths and those sections
are not unique in type and location.
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