Kiambu, 07 March 2016 – When Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta announced that Kenya and indeed Africa would host the first ever Tokyo International Conference on Africa’s Development outside Japan in August, he observed: ”TICAD is promoting the principles of African ownership for the processes encapsulated in the African Union Agenda 2063, with a clear focus to provide decent and productive jobs for the African people, especially the youth.”

Although TICAD VI is seeking high-level policy and political dialogue for urbanization in Africa, it will also provide opportunities for exhibiting solutions for some of the challenges associated with the rapid urbanization in Africa. In Kenya, to improve the growing solid waste challenge, the County Government of Kiambu has successfully completed the first ever semi-aerobic sanitary landfill in Africa using the Fukuoka method. The landfill was built with the support of Sweden and technical assistance of Fukuoka University.

A high-level delegation of UN-Habitat Assistant Secretary General, Dr. Aisa Kirabo Kacyira, Prof Sam Ongeri, Kenya’s Permanent Representative to UN-Habitat, and Mr. Ito Yo, Japan’s Deputy Permanent Representative to UN-Habitat visited Kiambu’s landfill in Thika. Speaking during the visit, Dr. Kacyira praised the Government of Japan for their support to UN-Habitat.

Dr. Kacyira also noted, “UN-Habitat is looking forward to build on the experience of Kiambu to support other national and local governments improve waste management.” Mr. Ito Yo expressed satisfaction with the work of Kiambu, “It is good to see that a Japanese methodology can be used to addressed key challenges. We hope this can be used in other African countries.” Applauding Kiambu and UN-Habitat’s contribution to sustainable urbanization in Africa, Prof. Ongeri observed; “ This landfill will be a good opportunity to show that projects done through international cooperation can successful and TICAD VI is a good window to showcase this landfill and UN-Habitat’s work in Africa.”