Parliament has handed the National Forestry and Tree Planting (Amendment) Bill, 2024, as a part of the continuing authorities coverage on rationalisation of its businesses.
The Bill goals to combine the features of the National Forestry Authority (NFA) into the Ministry of Water and Environment.
The Minister of State for Water and Environment (Environment), Hon. Beatrice Anywar, mentioned that integrating the NFA into the ministry aligns with Uganda National Development Plan III, which emphasises effectivity, useful resource optimisation, and institutional concord to reinforce service supply and accountable public expenditure administration.
“This will get rid of duplicate roles and foster coordinated administrative preparations, insurance policies, and procedures for efficient administration and monetary accountability inside authorities businesses,” she mentioned through the plenary session chaired by Speaker, Anita Among, on Wednesday October 23, 2024.
She highlighted the anticipated advantages of the NFA’s integration, together with improved service supply, supervision, and monitoring of central forest reserves. She added that this alteration is projected to save lots of the federal government about Shs3 billion in emoluments, handle wage disparities, and streamline procurement processes.
The Chairperson of the Committee on Environment and Natural Resources, Hon. Geoffrey Feta, reiterated the necessity to mainstream the NFA features to mitigate monetary drain on public sources.
The committee indicated that the ministry has a powerful construction prepared to soak up over 80 % of NFA employees.
“The Certificate of Financial Implications from the Ministry of Planning and Economic Development, estimates this integration might yield web financial savings of Shs22.1 billion within the Financial Year 2024/2025 and Shs26.4 billion within the Financial Year 2025/2026, in addition to projected terminal advantages for NFA employees amounting to Shs4.3 billion in the identical 12 months,” he mentioned.
The committee expressed concern over unlawful land parcels inside forest reserves, reporting the cancellation of 120 unlawful land titles in 2019 and ongoing efforts to annul over 609 titles in Central Forest Reserves.
Members supported the rationalisation accusing the NFA of failure to handle huge destruction of forest cowl.
Hon. David Kabanda (NRM, Kasambya County) accused the company of issuing doubtful licenses to the detriment of the setting.
Hon. Muhammad Muwanga Kivumbi (NUP, Butambala County) mentioned that the entity oversaw the depletion of forest cowl in Buganda.
However, Hon. Christine Kaaya (NUP, Kiboga District Woman Representative) introduced a minority report opposing the rationalisation. She mentioned that the NFA has considerably improved its monetary efficiency, reaching an 83 % enhance in non-tax income over the previous 4 years.
“The NFA’s development trajectory, with projected non-tax income of Shs20.332 billion for monetary 12 months 2024/25, demonstrates that it shouldn’t be rationalized,” she argued.
The NFA is answerable for managing 506 Central Forest Reserves (CFRs) protecting roughly 1.265 million hectares, representing 26 % of Uganda’s whole forest cowl.
Rationalisation of Agencies and Public Expenditure (RAPEX) goals to handle purposeful duplication and promote efficient governance constructions, contributing to the overarching targets of the National Development Plan III and guaranteeing strategic utilisation of presidency sources for sustainable socio-economic transformation.
