Catch it while you still can: Lesser flamingos feed on the 'blue-green algae' Spirulina. Actually a type of cyanobacterium, Spirulina only grows in salty conditions inhospitable to many lifeforms, and can give Lake Natron a pink or red colour. It also accounts for the birds' pink pigmentation.
Credit: James Warwick/Birdlife International
SYDNEY: One of the world's greatest wildlife spectacles – featured in countless documentaries – is threatened by a project to industrially develop a remote lake in Africa's Great Rift Valley.
According to the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) officials in Tanzania are today assessing plans for a soda ash plant on Lake Natron, the world's most important breeding site for the threatened lesser flamingo.
"Lake Natron's vast flocks of shimmering pink flamingos are one of the world's greatest wildlife attractions. These spectacular birds deserve the strongest protection we can offer them," said British broadcaster and naturalist Sir David Attenborough.
"Any threat to their future would not only be an ecological disaster, it would deal a huge blow to tourism in East Africa which helps ensure the survival of the region's spectacular wildlife and wild places," he added.
Major hatchery
Attenborough is backing a coalition of experts – including conservation groups in 23 African countries – who have signed a petition urging the Tanzanian government to turn down the proposal.
Lake Natron is in northern Tanzania, close to the Kenyan border. More than one million lesser flamingos nest on the lake – and it's thought that most of East Africa's 1.5 to 2.5 million lesser flamingos (75 per cent of the world's population) hatched at the site.
The lake's isolation safeguards the birds from predators and its algae food-rich waters, and neighbouring freshwater, create ideal breeding conditions. Its vast salt flats have been East Africa's only nesting place for lesser flamingos for 45 years.
The conservation coalition will advise Tanzanian environment minister Mark Mwandosya on whether to allow Lake Natron Resources – jointly owned by the Tanzanian government and the Indian company TATA Chemicals – to pump more than 100,000 litres of freshwater and 550,000 litres of saltwater from the area every hour, for the production of soda ash; a material used in glass and dye production.
"Ill-conceived project"
The RSPB said that a coal-fired power station, road and rail links and housing for 1,200 construction workers would be built at the site – and they argue that development would seriously harm tourism as well as the environment. They add that the soda ash plant could also alter Lake Natron's chemical balance, destroying the Spirulina variety of blue-green algae on which the birds feed.
"Lake Natron is a truly extraordinary place in a beautiful and unspoilt landscape, steeped in Masai culture and absolutely invaluable to wildlife. The loss of lesser flamingos could seriously harm tourism in the region," said Graham Wynne, chief executive of the RSPB based in Bedfordshire, England. "There is no reason on earth to allow this ill-conceived project. The economics are weak and the implications for wildlife and for the environment are deeply depressing."
Tanzania's National Environment Management Council will today consider the environmental assessment for the project before making its recommendation to the minister.
The lesser flamingo (Phoeniconaias minor) stands between four and five feet high but is the smallest of the six flamingo species. The species has long pink legs and a long neck. Its large body is rose-pink, the colour coming from pigments in Spirulina.
with the RSPB
