Environmentalists in East Africa are worried that more than ever before, wildlife and aquatic life are at risk of extinction due to oil exploration and production activities.

Discoveries of oil in East Africa have been made mostly in national parks, game reserves and lakes that are home to endangered species.

For example, in Uganda, seven out of 10 national parks and game reserves explored have oil deposits — Murchison Falls National Park, Queen Elizabeth National Park, the Semuli park as well as the Bugunga, Kabwoya and Kigezi wildlife reserves.

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In Kenya, oil exploration activities are being conducted in Turkana County in the north, in Tsavo National Park and along the Coast. Now civil society organisations want oil companies to strike a balance between environment protection and their exploration activities.

Although Rwanda is yet to discover oil deposits, exploration works have been ongoing in lake Kivu, the country’s largest lake, and in other parts of the western province along its banks.

Environmentalists expressed their fears in Kigali this week during the 7th East African Petroleum Conference and Exhibition.

Edgar Buhanga, deputy director in charge of planning at the Uganda Wildlife Authority said: “We have an overlap in oil exploration, extraction and conservation of the environment, although our mandate is to make use of oil without endangering wildlife.”

Uganda’s oil is predicted to last 25 years if no new discoveries are made, meaning that wildlife would be under serious threat during that period if no attention is paid to the environment.

Environmentalists say that if governments and oil companies give priority to oil, which is not renewable, at the expense of tourism, it would hurt the economic prospects of the local people, many of whom depend on tourism for their livelihood.

According to the 2013 World Bank report, Tourism in Africa: Harnessing Tourism for Growth and Improved Livelihoods, the five member states are projected to create 1,086,000 jobs in the sector by 2021.

Tanzania’s tourism industry, the World Bank notes, will have the highest number of employees in the region, projected at 463,900, up from 432,100 in 2014, followed by Kenya at 272,500 up from 247,300 workers; Uganda will employ 251,100, up from 202,100.

The number of people working in Rwanda’s tourism sector will rise from 54,200 to 62,500, while those in Burundi will increase to 36,000 from 31,100.

But environmentalists say that without good policies that ensure the co-existence of wildlife and the oil boom, the sector is unlikely to achieve these gains.

“Oil companies can employ technologies that explore and extract natural resources clearly but in most cases they opt for cheaper alternatives in order to maximise profits,” said Robert Ddamulira, energy co-ordinator at WWF regional office for Africa.

But Richard Sezibera, the East African Community Secretary General, said the Secretariat was working on a legal environmental framework to guide exploration and production activities.

“We are trying to harmonise all these aspects and pass petroleum laws that will serve the interests of all,” said Dr Sezibera.