The Mudi River Project, Malawi

We were very busy during our trip and didn’t always have an opportunity to blog about all the  fantastic projects we saw. Here's a blog I wrote about an ambitious project in Malawi.

River Mudi before it flows through Blantyre

The River Mudi flows through the city of Blantyre, in Malawi. Levels of pollution in the river are many times higher than the internationally accepted standard for water quality. Sewage and industrial waste pours into the river due to a combination of heavy industry, inadequate management,  local people dumping their waste, broken pipes and the sewage system failing. This is a serious problem because the Mudi River is a major source of water for domestic and other uses for communities that live downstream. Not only that, the Mudi has become a health hazard for the population of Blantyre who must live and work alongside the polluted stink of the river.

The Rotary Club of Blantyre have decided to clean up the river, putting together a taskforce to tackle the problem. It's an undeniably ambitious undertaking, but something they feel is essential for the future of their city. This involves mobilising the Blantyre Water Board, Department of the Environment and the City Council, as well as businesses and local people too. Encouraging collaboration, they have been meeting weekly, led by the current president of the Rotary Club, Sundu Jere. 

River Mudi near central market place

Sundu took us on a tour of the river which vividly demonstrated the problem. We followed the course of the river from where its stored in a reservoir at one end of town, right to the other side of town where the water is heavily polluted. Yet is still used by some of the local population for washing and drinking because they do not have another water source available. Blantyre City is a watershed to many rivers; this means pollution in the city affects not only people in Blantyre but also those who use the rivers that originate from the city.

President Sundu Jere explains the sewage treatment plans

Sundu explained, ‘when I was a kid we could play by the river, but not anymore. In the summer the smell from the river affects everyone. There is a clear dividing line between where the water in the river flows clean and then where it becomes undrinkable, a health hazard.’

The challenges are clearly huge, but Sundu is determined that Rotary must play a big part, as nothing is being done at present. The president has even acquired a new nickname around Blantyre, ‘Mr Mudi.’

The first phase of the project is to re-instigate the sewage treatment plant. Built in the 1970s, the facilities at the plant haven’t worked properly for 10 years. The city has a population of 1.2 million during the day and 735,000 at night, and currently 80% of the sewage is untreated and goes straight into the river. When we visited the treatment plant we saw the dilapidated state it had fallen into. The great news is that The Rotary club have secured funding to get the plant working again and the land has recently been cleared in preparation for this to happen.

Garden business in Blantyre

Another problem the project faces is that the river flows through an industrial area and waste from here also finds its way into the water. Although many of the industries do have waste management activities in place, the waste pipes that they use have been damaged or even completely removed by vandals and people selling the pipes for scrap. So in these areas the waste simply goes into the river. The Rotary Club has thought of a solution for this too, they plan to replace them with concrete pipes.
Compounding the problem is the lack of any up to date environmental regulations, the penalty for polluting the river has not changed since the 70s and even if a company does get fined the fee is nominal and unlikely to prevent them from doing it again. The legislation has not been updated so there is no mechanism to discourage polluting. Again, the Rotary are tackling this problem by working with the industries and local authorities.

As well as working on these kinds of ‘top down’ approaches they have introduced some innovative ‘bottom up’ activities too. A fantastic example of this was an initiative at the smaller tributaries along the river, which involves allocating plots to vendors who grow shrubs and flowers. This prevents localised rubbish dumping as the growers take ownership of their area along the river.

These green and meticulously ordered oasis run alongside the streams and have transformed the areas from wasteland where people felt free to dump whatever they liked, to beautiful gardens and small businesses. 

Garden business along the river

The Rotary Club has also been busy building local support for the project and using the media to put pressure on the right people in order to get the project moving. This raises the profile of the River Mudi project so that people start to ask questions when progress is not made. The project even has its own Facebook page.

When we asked Sundu why he thought the Rotary Club needed to become involved in such an ambitious project his answer was simple, ‘You can’t expect someone else to clean up after you, we have to do it ourselves. There are people ready to do the work, to clean up the river, but there is no funding to allow them to begin. This is a project that will make life better for everyone in Blantyre.’  

There is no doubt that its going to take time, hard work and a lot of determination. But with the Rotary Club spearheading the project there is at least hope that cleaning up the river Mudi can and will happen. A clean river is a vision that Rotary are making into a reality, and if they succeed it will be an incredible legacy for the people of Blantyre.