<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 12.0pt 0cm 6.0pt 0cm;"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">The Lake Victoria Basin Integrated Water Resources Management (LVB – IWRM) Programme is a coordinated and systematic cross-border approach for sustainable development, allocation and monitoring of the Lake Victoria water resource. The Programme activities cover five EAC Partner States of Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 12.0pt 0cm 6.0pt 0cm;"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">A lot of transboundary issues make the water management of Lake Victoria challenging and sometimes delicate. Overfishing of the lake, siltation from erosion of deforested watersheds, species introduction, industrial pollution, pollution through municipal wastewater, lack of water storage and runoff from agricultural areas are amongst the most pressing issues in water management of the basin. The LVBC is therefore intensifying its efforts on IWRM, to address the urgent need for regional coordination among the Partner States.</span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-size: 12.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">The overall objective of the programme is to improve water quality and availability through strategic and sustainable management of the LVB via regional IWRM investments and related measures. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 12.0pt 0cm 6.0pt 0cm;"><span lang="EN-GB" style="font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB;">To achieve the objective, an integrated and programmatic regional approach was established with the following specific objectives:</span></p>
<ol>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; text-indent: -14.15pt;"><strong>Specific Objective 1:</strong> LVBC Secretariat performs its function of strategic regional water resource management; and </span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong>Specific Objective 2:</strong> Effluents into the Lake Victoria are reduced through targeted infrastructure investments in wastewater collection and treatment, and solid waste management and sensitization of beneficiaries.<span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></span></li>
</ol>