Deputy Governor receiving a Khs 68.4 Million cheque to kick off the disbursement of bursary and scholarships to schools ( Picture By Collins Owuor)

By Matilda Atieno

Kisumu County today launched the disbursement of Ksh. 68.4 Million in bursaries and scholarships to 9629 beneficiaries in a colorful ceremony held at the Mama Grace Onyango cultural center.

The allocation will benefit secondary, university and driving school students across the county with 12,641,971, going towards scholarships, 27, 625,000 and 14,811,643 for university fees. The beneficiaries under these categories qualify for the scholarship.

Deputy Governor Dr. Mathew Owili presided over the ceremony on behalf of the Governor Prof Peter Anyang’ Nyong’o. He said the program had slowed down due to the Covid-19 and the delay in the remittance of money to counties from the national treasury.

Dr. Owili asked the County departments of Education and Finance to prioritize bursary and scholarships to avoid delays in remittances to schools. He also appealed to the beneficiaries to work hard in their studies , saying it was to the only way to express gratitude to the County Government.

This year, additional 350 students who had been selected to join Form One have benefited from the funds and another 16,694 students were awarded bursaries, out of this, 5,296 are girls. This fund has successfully contributed to the realization of dreams to many beneficiaries.

The bursary targets bright, needy and vulnerable children with 350 marks and above. Dr Owili said the selection process was transparent.
“The applicants are taken through a transparent selection process which involves the application of the potential beneficiaries at the ward level,” said the Deputy Governor.
He added: “The ward committee conducts vetting and identification of the applicants with each ward getting a total allocation of 4million.”

Education ICT and HRD Executive Committee Member, Mwalimu John Awiti, announced that 70 more ECD teachers are set to be posted in their respective centers across the county.
Mr. Owiti pledged to work together with stakeholders for the success of the program to help stop delays.

Also present were officials of the Kenya secondary heads association (KESHA) and the Kenya primary headteachers association (KEPHA) who applauded the exercise and proposed to be included in the vetting committee to support the vetting process to help minimise the challenges.

The Deputy Governor used the opportunity to urge residents to adhere to the COVID-19 control measures to help stop the spread of the disease.

The event was attended by Executive Committee members, Dr. Joyce Osogo, Prof. Boaz Nyunya and Mr. Salmon Orimba, Majority leader Kenneth Onyango, Chairman of the County Assembly Committee on education Hon. David Arao, Market / Mlimani ward MCA, Seth Kanga and several Members of the county assembly.

Others were the , Deputy County Commissioner for Kibet Bowen, Chief officer Education ICT and HRD, Mrs. Penina Onyango, Ag Chief of staff and Chief officer Communication Mr. John Oywa, Sub-County Administrators Ward Administrators, Representative of the county director education and other county officers.

By Matilda Atieno

The second edition of the Kusi Ideas festival kicked off in Kisumu today with calls for collaborative efforts to address the post-Covid 19 socio- economic challenges facing various sectors.

President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Rwandan counterpart, Paul Kagame virtually addressed the festival’s opening ceremony.

The two day festival co-sponsored by the Nation Media Group and the Kisumu County Government is being held at the Ciala Resort.

The festival intends to explore ideas under the theme “Towards post covid-19 Africa: Recovery together.
In his official speech, Kisumu Governor Prof. Peter Anyang’ Nyong’o said Kenya has been hit hard by the pandemic, hence the need for urgent interventions.

On his part president Kagame called for a continuous collaboration adding Africa has natural talent that must be tapped to create innovative and new ways to invest in its people.

The Governor noted that this years edition of Kusi will go down in history as having been celebrated under a crisis, the pandemic which has ravaged the world, leaving deaths, and wrecked economies in its wake.

Governor Nyong’o said that life must continue and the people must learn how to keep safe and continue to fight the disease under the new normal.

The Governor said Kisumu County, wasc working to implement a Covid-19 Social Economic re-engineering recovery strategy that will run up to 2023.

He called on the private sector to help in the
resource mobilisation efforts to help address the post covid 19 challenges.

On the much anticipated COVID-19 vaccine, the Governor noted that the impending roll out was good news but warned Kenyans against relaxing in enforcing the covid regulations.

By Emily Mikwa

A visionary multi-sector partnership designed to give Kisumu residents their right to a clean, healthy environment devoid of diseases has been officially launched by the County Government in collaboration with Complex Urban Systems for Sustainability and Health (CUSSH) at the Pinecone Hotel in Kisumu on Friday.

Public engagement approach is an all-inclusive participatory initiative where the stakeholders and the waste handlers especially from the four targeted informal settlements in Kisumu will be brought on board to share innovative ideas on how to manage waste within the county.

Therefore, based on this premise, the CUSSH project targets  to capacity build waste handlers within four informal settlements in Kisumu: Nyalenda, Obunga, Kondele and Manyatta in a bid to co-develop local solutions with residents and community-based organizations, co-develop accessible materials to communicate challenges and solutions, encourage media communication around environment and health  and  to share interactive decision science, case studies, and artistic responses from Kisumu web portal that will subsequently include other emerging subsidiary towns

While representing the CECM Water, Environment, Climate Change and Natural Resources, Mr. Salmon Orimba, the Director in charge of Environment policy and strategy development Mr. Dan Ong’or, who presided over the official launch of the project, outlined some of the interventions the county government has implemented for the last three years.to ensure a clean, healthy environment for the people.

He stated that the County government has developed a raft of measures including policies on climate change Act and policy, the solid waste management policy and Act which is underway. The measures in place include: regular cleaning of Kachok and residential, development of departmental strategic Plan, Waste infrastructure/facility-Kasese-recycling unclogging drainages, un and Operationalizing tree nurseries towards 10% tree cover

Mr. Ong’or further underscored the significance of having the community participate in this program since waste management requires inclusivity, leaving no one behind and that waste offers employment opportunities along the value chains.

The Kisumu Central sub county Administrator, Mr. Jagero on his part emphasized on the slogan “Our planet is our health” to call on everyone to take responsibility in waste management to make our environment clean now that Africities conference 2021 to be hosted in Kisumu is fast approaching.

He pledged support to waste handlers advising them to use government structure up to the village level to report on challenges they face when dealing in waste.

The Director Environment and Stewardship Mr. Ken Koyooh noted that the CIDP promotes public engagement and sensitization promising to ride on this to have the people work as a team on matters waste management.

He reiterated that the county will provide an enabling environment as guided by the principles of solid waste management Act 2015 which is currently being reviewed on sustainability issues.

Mr. Koyooh was also optimistic that the knowledge shared among waste actors will offer local or homegrown solutions that will assist in shaping behavior change by ensuring proper sorting of waste at the production level for proper disposal or recycling.

Sentiments shared by the Director Climate Change, Mr. Evans Gichana who also announced that the Climate Change Act of 2020 is complete and ready for launch come next week, explaining that the Act gives provision of 2% of the development allocation to go into climate change programs where waste management is a component. 

 Mr. Harun who represented the City Director for environment Mr. Ben Otieno acknowledged that urbanization comes with a lot of challenges on waste management, recalling how this led to the development of Kisumu sustainable integrated solid waste management formulated 20years ago to engage communities on waste management.

With the increasing population, Mr. Harun says Kisumu generates 0.4 tons per capita multiplied with the number of households, highlighting that the principle of waste management includes collection, transportation, sorting and disposal.

He says Kachok has been partially decommissioned but it is a laborers process, since getting a dumpsite has been a challenge given that the better part of Kisumu sits on a marshland (flood prone) hence recycling is key to waste management.

Madam Isabella Asamba from Maseno University on her part gave an overview of the goal of the project, the partners involved and how they plan to engage the public through identification of waste champions, mapping waste hotspots, the opportunities, the challenges and how to develop homegrown solutions on waste management. The event was also marked with the veteran waste handlers from the targeted informal settlements sharing their experiences highlighting on the opportunities and challenges that comes with waste handling and exhibitions of artistic works made from recycled waste materials such as woven bags, building blocks, necklaces, and cards among others.

CEC Member for Agriculture livestock and fisheries Gilchrist Okuom addressing participants during the sensitization session  of Members of the County Assembly Agriculture Committee on Aquaculture Business Development Program (ABDP) at the Sunset Hotel (Picture by David Wadulo)

By Emily Mikwa

The County Directorate of Fisheries yesterday carried out a sensitization session   on Aquaculture Business Development Program (ABDP) to the Members of the County Assembly sitting in the Agriculture Committee at the Sunset Hotel, in Kisumu

The sensitization, which was facilitated by the County Fisheries experts, was done with the support of the International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD) and the state Department for Fisheries, aquaculture and Blue Economy.

While officially opening the session, the County Executive Committee Member for Agriculture, Irrigation, Livestock and Fisheries, Mr. Gilchrist Okuom highlighted that the ABDP is an 8years program funded by IFAD and it is being undertaken within 15 counties nationwide, Kisumu being one of them.

He further reiterated that the department targeted to sensitize the County Assembly Agriculture committee members on the existence of the program which will be undertaken in various wards within the County to create awareness and to make the rest of the members of the Assembly understand the program.

The ABDP program costing a total of USD 143.3 million (KES 14.9 billion),  focuses on reducing poverty and increasing food security and nutrition in rural communities with the intention of increasing the incomes, food security and improving nutritional status of the communities of poor rural households involved in aquaculture among the targeted Counties.

It further aims at using both public and private sector channels to strengthen the aquaculture value chains with whole-community initiatives to promote good nutrition and food security, environmental sustainability and adaptation to climate change.

The program has two  components; first  is the smallholder aquaculture development which aims to raise the efficiency, profitability and sustainability of ongoing and new aquaculture activities in mixed smallholder farming systems, with associated nutrition activities to improve diet quality and

Secondly the  component of aquaculture value chain development which seeks to improve the efficiency of the whole aquaculture value chain, with a concentration of Program effort and resources on operations that either include smallholders directly or demonstrably benefit the mass of small-scale producers.

The ABDP is envisaged as national in scope but targeting counties with high concentrations of aquaculture activity, high production, existing sectoral infrastructure (processing, marketing and research), adequate water resources and marketing potential.

The first start up counties were: Central Kenya Region: Nyeri, Kirinyaga, Meru and Western Kenya Region: Kakamega, Homa Bay, Migori while the second start up counties include

Central Kenya Region: Tharaka Nithi, Embu, Kiambu, Machakos, Kajiado.

Western Kenya Region: Busia, Siaya, Kisumu and Kisii

Implementation of the Program in the Counties will be done in compliance with devolution law as spelled out in the Kenya Constitution 2010.

The implementation at County level will be done in full compliance with the Program objectives, implementation arrangements and fiduciary requirements as will be guided by the Program Implementation Manual (PIM).