Zambia Launches US$45 Million World Bank Funded TB Project

The banner for the TB project

By Paul Shalala

Mining activities in Zambia bring the much needed revenue for development.

Being the second largest copper producer in Africa, Zambia largely depends on taxes from the mines to cushion its coffers.

However, mining has its own effects on people's health.

Tuberculosis (TB) is one disease which is predominantly found in mining towns.

For example, the Copperbelt Province has the highest cases of TB among provinces in the country.

According to Ministry of Health records, out of every 100,000 Copperbelt residents, about 1,112 have TB.

This figure is higher than the national average for 2014 which stood at 39 TB cases per 100,000 residents in 2014, according to World Health Organisation (WHO)’s TB Country Profile for Zambia.

Health Minister Dr. Chitalu Chilufya

“TB is an emergency. It must be fought in an urgent manner. We need a multi-sectoral approach to defeat it,” said Health Minister Dr. Chitalu Chilufya in Kitwe yesterday when he launched the Southern Africa Tuberculosis and Health System Support Project.

The World Bank funded project is aimed at fighting TB in mining towns where thousands of residents are patients.

The World Bank has incorporated the Ministries of Health, Labour and Mines to implement the project, with the Ministry of Health being the lead.

In the next five years, the three ministries will work together to fight TB in the mining sector.

“The impact of TB on the economy is big. Loss of productivity, loss of man hours and the loss of family income,” added Dr. Chilufya.

Labour Minister Joyce Simukoko, believes that the project will help miners access health services.

Labour Minister Joyce Simukoko

“My office has been receiving cases of miners fearing to report their illnesses to their superiors for fear of being fired. I want to warn employers that we will not spare anyone who threatens workers. They deserve to have medical help,” said Mrs Simukoko.

Meanwhile, World Bank Country Manager Ina Ruthenberg disclosed that the Southern Africa Tuberculosis and Health System Support Project is being implemented in a total of four Southern African countries at the total cost of US$122 million.

She named the countries as Malawi, Mozambique, Lesotho and Zambia.

“The project will therefore support the implementation of the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) Heads of State Declaration of 2012 on TB as an Emergency in the Mining Sector and will also support the region and Zambia’s progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals, which include TB and the World Health Organisation’s End TB Targets,” said Ms Ruthenberg in a speech read for her by World Bank Senior Health Specialist Ronald Mutasa at the launch of the project.

In the course of the implementation phase, a Center of Excellence will be built at the Kitwe-based Occupational Health and Safety Institute where equipment will also be installed.

World Bank Senior Health Specialist Ronald Mutasa

The equipment will help in early detection and surveillance of TB.

According to Occupational Health and Safety Institute Director Dr. Connard Mwansa, the Center of Excellence will make service delivery easy for the miners.

"We will be able to conduct various services we do not currently do. Most cases we refer miners to the hospital but when get the equipment, we will be able to provide alot of services at the center," said Dr. Mwansa in an interview.

Meanwhile, two unions in the mining sector have welcomed the Southern Africa Tuberculosis and Health System Support Project saying it will save many lives.

"We thank the World Bank for the US$45 million project. this will help the Occupational Health and Safety Institute finish the office they are constructing in Solwezi. As you know, the North Western Province has a number of mines and this project will help in our members there to be served in their area," said Mine Workers Union of Zambia General Secretary Joseph Chewe.

Another mine union had similar sentiments.

"This investment by the World Bank will go a long way. It will make the Occupational Health and Safety Institute a One Stop Shop for miners. This will save thousands of our members who are affected by Tuberculosis," said National Union of Miners and Allied Workers President James Chansa in an interview.

By law, any person who is employed as a miner is supposed to be examined by the Occupational Health and Safety Institute which is located at the Mine Safety Department in Kitwe.

Every year, miners are also expected to be tested at the institute at least once to check their fitness.

This workload, which sees thousands of miners besieging the institute's offices, makes the job a bit difficult for the workers and the idea of a mobile team to be testing the miners in various mines and towns is being piloted. 

According to the WHO’s 2015 Country TB profile for Zambia, the southern African country recorded five thousand deaths due to TB in that year.

The report also revealed that 41, 588 TB cases where reported in 2015.

Zambia has only had one prevalence survey of Tuberculosis.

The National Tuberculosis Prevalence Survey 2013 – 2014 revealed that TB occurs three times higher in urban areas than in the rural areas.

In terms of gender, the survey revealed that more males were burdened by the disease than females.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The story was originally aired on TV1 on 30 March 2017 and it can be watched here. A follow up story specifically on the Regional Center of Excellence was also aired on TV1 on 01 April 2017 and its YouTube link can be accessed here.

World Bank's US$65.6M Credit Targets Zambia's Polluted Towns

World Bank Team with Central Province Permanent Secretary

By Paul Shalala in Kabwe

The World Bank has kick-started a five year environmental program aimed at alleviating the suffering of the people in three Zambian towns which are heavily polluted and whose residents have been affected by pollution.

The Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement Project is funded through a US$ 65.6 million credit facilitated by the World Bank’s International Development Association.

The project aims at reduce environmental health risks for people residing in polluted mining areas in Kabwe, Kitwe and Chingola Districts.

For the past 52 years, mining has been Zambia’s biggest revenue earner.

The country has largely depended on minerals, especially copper, for its survival.

The country is the second largest producer of copper in Africa and the third in the world.

However, this natural resource has its own challenges.

With over decades of mining having been done in Zambia, the legacy of mineral extraction has not been good.

In mining towns like Chingola, rivers and streams have been contaminated by the mines.

This has led to people getting sick while a handful have died due to pollution.

At an Action Aid-organised forum for residents of Chingola to speak out about pollution last month, many residents could not hide their anger.

“We have seen people die, we have seen people getting sick, we have seen water polluted. But nothing is being done to stop this pollution,” said Bernadette Mulamba, a Chingola resident and an environmental activist with the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace.

A few days earlier, Chingola Mayor Titus Tembo had complained of Zambia’s largest mining firm Konkola Copper Mines (KCM) of having polluted the Mushishima stream leading to fish die and villagers picking and eating it.

“KCM has polluted the.Mushihsima stream killing fish. Because of poverty, our people are eating the dead fish and some have become sick, said Mr Tembo.

The story is the same in Kitwe which hosts major mines.

Here, both air and water pollution has been reported.

In December last year, the Kafue river which supplies water to the city of Kitwe was polluted with high levels of sulphate which forced the Nkana Water and Sewerage Company to switch off water supply to the city which has over 500,000 residents.

This was followed by the Zambia Environmental Management Agency (ZEMA) instituting investigations on seven mining firms which discharge water into the Mwambashi stream and the Kafue river.

ZEMA inspectors collecting samples at Muntimpa Dam

ZEMA inspectors took samples from the seven companies and tested them in three separate laboratories but to date, the results are still being awaited.

And in Kabwe, the legacy of lead and zinc mining is evident.

The town, which is infamously called a ghost town, is said to be the worst hit city in the world in terms of lead poisoning.

According to data from the World Bank Country Office in Zambia, studies done in 2003 – 2006 showed that the content of lead in soil in certain areas of Kabwe were as high as 26,000 mg/kg against the acceptable levels of about 10 to 50 mg/kg making the land unsuitable for residential and agricultural purposes.

With these case studies and accounts of real pollution in the three mining towns, the World Bank Board of Executive Directors on 20 December, 2016 approved the credit for the Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement project.

The project is expected to benefit 70,000 people who live in the areas heavily polluted by the mines.

On Saturday, a team of World Bank officials from the Zambian office and the bank’s international headquarters in Washington DC visited Kabwe to launch the project.

The team explained why the Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement Project is important to people in the three mining towns.

“Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement Project will be implemented for five years from 2016 to 2021. The project’s objective is to reduce environmental health risks on the local population which is associated with mining in criticall polluted areas of Kabwe and other Copperbelt towns,” said World Bank Country Manager Ina-Marlene Ruthenberg.

She revealed that the project will: “Clean up some parts of the old mining town of Kabwe which still has unacceptably high levels of lead in the soil and high Blood Lead level among children, resulting from the past lead mining in the area.”

And newly appointed Central Province Permanent Secretary Chanda Kabwe, who hosted the team in his office, pledged the Zambian government’s support for the project.

Mr Kabwe, who is just a few days in the office, spent the past three years as District Commissioner in the mining towns of Mufulira and Kitwe which are both polluted by mining.

“Having come from the Copperbelt where I saved in the mining towns, I pledge my support to ensure this project succeeds. Central Province is predominantly an agriculture area and pollution affects the crop. This could also affect food security. So we will ensure this project succeeds so we can fight poverty,” said Mr Kabwe.

The Project will work with the City Councils in Kabwe, Kitwe and Chingola to ensure that the impact in terms of implementation is owned by the respective local authorities.

The polluted Shimulala stream in Chingola

And leaders in the respective municipalities are happy that the project will alleviate some of the suffering their people go through.

Kabwe Municipal Council Director of Public Health Paul Mukuka had this to say: “In the past we have had JICA (Japan International Corporation Agency) and the Copperbelt Environment Project doing a number of studies in Kabwe. We hope the coming of the World Bank project will help save more lives from pollution.”

For Kitwe Mayor Christopher Kangombe, the project is more than welcome to the country's second largest city.

“We commend the World Bank for committing US$65.6 million to this project. We welcome this project and hope it will help us reduce the effects of pollution in Kitwe. We however wait to learn the scope of work,” said Mr Kangombe.

Kitwe-based Ministry of Mines Director of Mine Safety Gideon Ndalama will serve as the National Coordinator for the Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement Project.

In this role, Mr Ndalama will work with the World Bank, the three municipalities and the Zambia Environmental Management Agency.

“This is a locally entrenched project, we should all own it. This is the only way we will have sustainability,” said Ndalama.

In terms of benefits to the local people, this project targets to provide medical interventions to over 30,000 children.

The projects plans to reduce Blood Lead Level (BLL) by 50% among children under the age of 15.

Over 4,000 of these children are expected to be tested for BLL by 2022.

World Bank Environment Specialist Mwansa Lukwesa explains that the health component to the Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement project is important because pollution has effects on people’s health.

“The project will test and treat children under the age of five and giving them supplements. The issues of lead poisoning are linked with nutrition because most of the people affected are poor,” he said.

By the year 2021, the Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement Project is expected to reduce lead contamination in Kabwe by 70 percent.

Further, the project also aims to empower 500 women and unemployed youths with income generating activities which will keep them away from jobs that expose them to lead poisoning.

Due to lack of jobs, some Kabwe residents have broken locks to the tailing dams and opened them to have access to quarrying stones.

The Zambia Mining Environment Remediation and Improvement Project is the second environmental program the Bretton Woods institution has funded in Zambia to fight pollution in mine areas.

Between 2003 and 2011, the World Bank funded the Copperbelt Environment Project which produced some findings which the current project aims to build on.

Kabwe was at the center of lead mining from 1902 until the mine was closed in 1994.

Illegal stone quarrying in the former mine has continued and a recent tour by this blogger found some residents conducting driving lessons at the former mine site.

All these activities increase people's exposure to lead.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story was also produced as a 7 minutes documentary which aired on TV2's Morning Live Program on 19 January 2017 and it was again broadcast on TV1's Newsline program on 20 January 2017. You can watch the documentary which aired on Newsline on this YouTube link: Zambia Mining Pollution Documentary

Zambia Courts IMF For Economic Recovery

Mr Mutati (Second left) with IMF officials after a meeting

By Paul Shalala

Zambia has commenced talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to find ways in which the Bretton Woods institution can help the southern African country emerge stronger from its current economic challenges.

The country is the world’s third largest producer of copper after Chile and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The newly sworn in Finance Minister Felix Mutati is in Washington attending the annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank.

Today, Mr Mutati held closed door meetings with IMF officials and discussed Zambia’s economic recovery programme which he is championing.

“The minister said the country had a huge financing gap that was negatively impacting the country’s inflation rate worsened by low copper prices adding that the banking sector was currently holding up to 10 percent of bad debt. The Minister said the government would announce the economic recovery program in the coming budget,” reads part of a statement issued by Zambia’s embassy in Washington after the Minister’s closed door meeting.

A few days ago, Ministry of Finance Spokesperson Chileshe Kandeta announced that a team of IMF officials will be in the country this month to meet various stakeholders ahead of an expected financial bailout.

Zambia is heavily reliant on copper sales and the drop in its price has reduced the country’s revenue and increased in inflation.

A few months ago, the Chinese owned Baluba mine in Luanshya was placed on care and maintenance, sending 1,600 workers on forced leave.

Last month, African Rainbow Minerals which holds 40% shares in Chililabombwe-based Lubambe mine, announced that it was selling its stake due to low copper prices.

With this in mind, Mr Mutati, who is barely a month in office, has come up with an economic recovery plan which he hopes will resuscitate the economy.

The plan includes removing subsidies on a number of products in the coming years.

Zambia's US$4.2 Million Irrigation Project Kicks Off

By Paul Shalala in Luanshya

Senior officers at the project site

The World Bank has funded the Zambia Correctional Service (ZCS) to a tune of US$ 4.1 million to set up 21 center points countrywide which are expected to irrigate over 100 hectares of land.

Under the Irrigation Development Support Program run by the ZCS, this funding is aimed at boosting Zambia's food security and reduce hunger.

The installation of these center pivots has already commenced and expectations are that the pivots will be able to produce maize and other crops year round.

Zambia's staple food is maize and the commodity sometimes becomes scarce due to the over reliance of rain water for growing the crop.

One site where the center pivots will be installed is Luanshya District on the Copperbelt.

There, a contractor is already on site and works have commenced.

The Zambia Correctional Service has already dug trenches and cleared the land where the four pivots will be installed.

Greenline Agricultural Service, the company which is installing the pivots, has started installing the first pivot which is expected to be complete within seven days.

"We are finishing the first center pivot within seven days. The remaining three will also finish within a month. We want to hand over this project to government as soon as possible," said Alfred Simfukwe, Greenline Agrultuural Limited Managing Director. 

This project will cost US$1.4 million.

Zambia Correction Service Commissioner General Percy Chato recently visited the Chitwi Prison Farm in Luanshya where the center pivots are being installed.

Trenches have already been dug

Mr Chato said the project is expected to triple the service’s annual output of maize production which is meant to feed prisoners and some surplus sold to the public.

He said once fully operational, the 21 center pivots will help in the production of maize throughout the year and will help reduce mealie meal prices and shortages of the staple food.

"We want to be a major contributor to food security in the country. At the moment, our contribution to national maize output is minimal but when all the 21 center pivots start working, we shall be producing maize in hundreds of hectares," said Mr Chato.

The Zambia Correctional Service was formerly known as the Zambia Prison Service.

Initially, the institution was running farms to feed prisoners but in the recent years, it has gone commercial.

In Kabwe, where the ZCS headquarters are based, the institution runs a milling plant which produces thousands of bags of mealie meal.

ZCS is even running a retail shop in Kabwe where the commodity is sold to the public.

World Bank Insures US$124m For Private Sector Investment In Zambia

Michel Wormser addressing journalists

By Paul Shalala

The World Bank says Zambia's attractive investment climate has seen its Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) insuring one hundred and twenty four million dollars of investment from the private sector.

MIGA Vice President Michel Wormser (right)  says most of the investment guarantees are in the agriculture sector where the World Bank wants to promote diversification.

Mr Wormser says more than 80 million dollars has been guaranteed for the agriculture sector in Zambia where the Bretton Woods Institution is already supporting ranching.

He has revealed that the World Bank is currently in talks with Zesco, the Copperbelt Energy Corparation and government to increase power generation in Zambia.

Mr Wormser says increasing Zambia's electricity generation has the potential to supply power to both the Southern and East Africa regions.

He was speaking at a media briefing in Lusaka on Monday.

The MIGA Vice President wass on a 2 day visit to Zambia to meet government officials and the private sector to help mobilise money for capital projects in the mining, energy and agribusiness sectors.

Donors Give Zambia $30m To Fight Abuse Of Funds

By Paul Shalala

Donors have offered Zambia a US$30million deal to reform its financial management regime and reduce abuse of public fund.

Finland, Germany,the United Kingdom and the World Bank have committed the funds through a trust fund to support the Public Financial Management Reform Programme (PFMRP).

World Bank Country Representative for Zambia Kundhavi Kadiresan (right) called the  of the programme as a milestone in Zambia's quest to have fiscal discipline.

"This programme must be embraced by all line ministries if it is to bear fruits. We have seen it succeed in other countries and here it must succeed too," said Kadiresan.

The launch of this programme in Lusaka this morning follows the continuous reports of massive abuse of public resources in every year's Auditor General's Report.

Under the five year programme, government is expected to tighten its internal controls to avoid misapplication and wastage of resources

During the launch of the Reform Programme in Lusaka this morning, Finance Minister Alexander Chikwanda in a speech read for him by Secretary to the Treasury Fredson Yamba, said the programme will help in managing public finances.

Meanwhile, the Policy Monitoring and Research Center has called on government to utilise the Anti-Corruption Commission by prosecuting all those ciyed by the Auditor General's report in abusing public funds.

"The launch of the reform programme is a good thing but we need the ACC to start prosecuting people who abuse funds. We need to see a situation where people are jailed for abusing tax payers money," said Michelle Morel, Executive Director of the Policy Monitoring and Research Center.

And Economics Association of Zambia President Isaac Ngoma has called for an external institution to provide oversight on the reform programme.

"Government must engage an external institution that will audit this reform programme. we are already thinking as stakeholders that this programme can succeed if well supported," said Ngoma.

New World Bank report rates Zambia among most improved on policy environment

By Paul Shalala in Kampala, Uganda

Zambia is among 13 Sub-Saharan countries which have been commended by the World Bank for showing a stable and improved policy environment for development.

According to the 2012 CPIA Index  which is an annual assessment of how countries are performing with their development policies to reduce poverty and spur opportunity, Zambia scored well in the last 12 months.

World Bank Chief Economist for Africa, Shanta Devarajan has launched the report today in the French capital Paris.

This latest World Bank review of policies and institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) shows an improved policy environment for growth and poverty reduction in 13 of the continent’s poorest countries.

The 13 countries which have showed improvements comprise: Comoros, Congo Republic, Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, The Gambia, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Togo, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

More broadly, most African countries show a stable or improved policy environment for development. This positive trend is especially important given the more severe economic climate being weathered by other countries, most notably in the developed world.