These Kenyan villagers are used to flooding. This is different.

Swamps are often thought of as desolate wastelands. Yet they are rich environments teeming with life – and vanishing quickly.

Around the world, wetlands are disappearing three times faster than forests from both climate change and development. Their transformation threatens not only plants and animals, but also the people who call wetlands home.

Just over a sandbar from the Kenyan side of Lake Victoria sits Yala, the country’s largest freshwater swamp, which is home to a half-million people.

The Luo, one of Kenya’s dozens of ethnic groups, have long inhabited this region and have drawn from it: catching fish, harvesting papyrus reeds for basket weaving and cooking fuel, and worshipping at shrines that dot the wetlands. 

Since the mid-20th century, Lake Victoria has undergone drastic ecological changes. The introduction of Nile perch and water hyacinth, both invasive species, has sent native fish numbers plummeting. Those effects, combined with intensive fishing and drainage for farming, have contributed to the extinction of more than 200 species. Meanwhile, an uptick in farming, industry, and urban development has fed eutrophication – an increase in biomass and algae that deoxygenates water and accelerates erosion.

As early as Kenya’s independence in 1963, the government has worked to reclaim Yala swamp and divert its rivers for agricultural use. Dams and reservoirs have displaced villagers, and conflicts over land use are rife. Officials view wetlands as territory for development, while conservationists see them as homes for unique flora and fauna that support communities’ cultures and livelihoods.

Since March 2020, floods have become constant. The encroaching waters have shut down schools and broken up families, as people debate whether to leave. For many Luo, Yala itself is a source of deep identity, and reverence for ancestors runs deep. 

“Where would we even go?” says Gordon Auma, an elder and fisherman in Maduwa. “We have no savings, nothing. Everything we know is here.” 

The ecological degradation has spurred the Kenyan government to announce a new wetlands policy this year, recognizing their “vital role” for the environment. Observers say there has been little implementation on the ground, and are waiting to see results. In Yala, meanwhile, many residents have one message: We’ll continue our lives here as long as we can.