| dc.description.abstract | Over the last 300 years 87% of the world’s wetlands have been lost, in Africa it is estimated that
131 million hectares are covered by wetlands ranging from coastal lagoon types in West Africa to
fresh brackish water lakes in east Africa. Wetlands are extremely susceptible to human
encroachment for settlement, agriculture, and brick laying among other activities (Isunju et al.,
2016). Although studies have been carried out on wetland use in Uganda, for example James
Gideon & Bernard, (2018), Little attention has been given to people’s attitudes and perceptions
towards wetland conservation in Kassanda district and yet such engagement would be critical for
wetland conservation. The purpose of this study is therefore to generate information on the
communities’ understanding and people’s mindset towards conservation of Bimbye wetland in
Kassanda district. The specific objectives of the study are to: identify the benefits of Bimbye
wetland to surrounding communities, assess the attitudes of local communities towards wetland
conservation, identify wetland conservation strategies used by the local communities. The study
employed cross sectional research designs that involved collecting data at one point in time. A
household survey method and sixty questionnaires were used. Quantitative data was coded, entered
and analyzed using IBM SPSS version 23 and Microsoft excel software to obtain frequencies,
percentages, graphs and charts. Correlation analysis was used to determine the influence of
demographic information on the attitudes of people towards wetland conservation. The majority
of the respondents agreed to wetland conservation because they are getting to understand the value
wetlands play in the environmental, socio-economic and cultural aspects. Flooding within towns
and other disasters have been the major eye openers in the recent times. The few people who
disagreed to wetland complained of discrimination on wetland use. Not disposing domestic waste
into the wetland was the main conservation strategy the community is considering. Locals are still
strongly willing to conserve despite their limited awareness about all the services provided by
Bimbye wetland especially supporting, regulating and cultural services. The Government and
relevant authorities should sensitize more the neighboring communities on the unseen regulating,
cultural and supporting services played by the wetlands, set and implement strict laws towards
conserving the wetland | en_US |
