Noise and Vibration Regulations for Uganda – With Consideration for People and the Environment 

By: Inge Hommedal, Acoustics consultant, specialist, Norconsult Norge AS, Regimentsvegen 158, NO-5705 Voss, Norway and Ivonne Verstappen, Head of Acoustics Department, Norconsult Norge AS,
Vestfjordgaten 4, NO-1338 Sandvika, Norway 

Uganda – in brief 

Uganda is a republic in East Africa, which is bordered by Tanzania, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and Kenya (see Figure 1). Uganda is a former British colony and became independent from Great Britain in 1962. 

In 2023 the population was almost 49 million. Most of the people live in the countryside, only 27% lives in urban areas. Approximately 72% of the land area is agricultural land. The population density is the highest along the northern coast of Lake Victoria, where several of the largest cities are located, including the capital of Uganda: Kampala (see Figure 1). The country’s northern areas are sparsely populated. Mixed land use is common in the urban areas. 

The country has three entries on the UNESCO World Heritage list: https://whc.unesco.org/en/statesparties/ug 

Uganda has one of the fastest-growing economies in Africa, yet they are on the list of the world’s least economically developed countries with 28% of the population still living in extreme poverty. 

There are few studies of noise in the environment in Africa. In Uganda, few but good Bachelor and Master theses have been submitted to the universities on noise in the environment, like the work on traffic noise exposure in the Kampala district.  

Uganda is a country with a lot of contrast, both related to the geography and biodiversity, with protected areas and national parks vs. urban centres like Kampala and Nansana where a lot of people live close to each other. Another important aspect is the difference between noise from e.g. hawkers and peddlers in the general environment vs. noise from professional stakeholders like big industrial companies. 

In contrast to northern regions of the world and especially Norway, everyday life in Uganda is generally taking place outdoor. This is especially relevant when it comes to setting limit values for environmental noise, which we will get back to later. 

Legal Background 

Since 2003 Uganda has had “The National Environment (Noise Standards and Control) Regulations”. These regulations were linked to “The National Environmental Act, Cap 153” from 1995. Since Uganda in 2019 put into use “The National Environment Act no. 5”, it was necessary to update the noise regulations.   

The Norwegian Environment Agency (NEA) is helping the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) in Uganda with this update. The project is a collaboration funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs under the “Energy for Development” program. 

Norway has guidelines and not regulations describing noise levels and how to apply results of noise assessments in spatial planning. The regulations from Uganda from 2003 are far more detailed than the Norwegian guidelines and seem to have roots in the legal tradition inherited from former colonial power Great Britain. 

One of the changes needed in the new regulations is that the technical term “limit value” had to be introduced, which means a value of any noise or vibration indicator of which exceeding causes competent authorities to consider or enforce mitigation measures. 

In the 2003 version of the regulations, annoyance is defined rather broadly: «Annoyance, means a feeling of displeasure evoked by noise, or any feeling of resentment, discomfort or irritation occurring when noise intrudes into another person’s thoughts or mood, or interferes with any activity being done by the affected person». 

Another important fact that influences the content of the regulations is that NEMA does not get much financial support from the government, which means that an important source of its income is case handling fees and fines related to enforcement. 

How Did We Proceed? 

Our work started with a deep dive to try to understand noise and vibration problems in Uganda, leaving some of our training as acoustics consultants in Norway behind – we felt we had to “move back to scratch”: 

• Which noise annoyances are relevant to Ugandans and the Ugandan society? 

• Uganda is an “outdoor society,” while Norway is an “indoor society” – this has major consequences. The day in Uganda is considered longer, according to that society’s rhythm. 

• How should the regulations be used? 

• How can one check that the regulations are used and complied with? 

• What about vibrations? Should both people, animals and buildings be protected in the vibration part of the regulations? 

• Anthropogenic underwater noise to aquatic fauna is also to be covered – not an easy task. 

• Which noise and vibration indicators are suitable?  

• Should the regulations be used to sort out existing noise and vibration problems, or do they only apply in planning future situations? 

Much was new and surprising to us, for example the various noise sources that were described in previous drafts of the regulations: 

• Amplified sound from radio, television, various categories of street vendors, parties, etc. Sounds from religious services is an issue. On the contrary, external sounds entering places of worship is not reported as an issue. 

• Of the more well-known types of noise, sound from nightclubs, discotheques, as well as construction noise can be mentioned. 

• Normal road traffic noise is given little attention, while noise from individual vehicles and machinery is discussed more carefully. 

• There are major challenges linked to nighttime noise and many sleep disturbances are experienced which, for example, affect children and attendance at schools. 

• All this must be seen in the context of a society without a well-functioning system for spatial planning, and a partial lack of fulfilment of existing plans. 

Real estates along roads are attractive in Uganda, this can provide opportunities for small-scale commercial activities, as well as places of residence. Such close coexistence, on the other hand, quickly leads to conflicts. 

In Norway, public authorities filed approx. 20,000 complaints about noise in 2023. Scaled up to Uganda’s larger population, this would correspond to approx. 200,000 complaints about noise in Uganda. No figures have been found for noise complaints registered with the Uganda bureau of statistics, nor on NEMA’s website. There is reason to assume that people usually don’t send official complaints about noise to the authorities in Uganda. However, noise pollution reaches the headlines of conventional media, like one headline covering the situation in Kampala in 2022: “Kampala reels under burden of unbearable noise and air pollution”: https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/science-health/kampala-reels-under-burden-of-noise-and-air-pollution-3916308. 

The work may be linked to at least seven of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, as indicated in Figure 2. 

We had the pleasure to meet the team from NEMA twice in Norway, both in 2023 and 2024. Besides these meetings in person, we had several video conference meetings to discuss the content of the regulations. 

A short overview of the different questions asked, and lessons learned: 

• Make a clear distinction in the regulations between external noise generated by private individuals and small-scale businesses on the one hand and large professional stakeholders on the other hand. The first-mentioned noise category is best regulated through limitations of activities and time periods – this makes it easier to follow up on guidelines in the regulations than if noise and vibration must be measured and monitored by personnel trained in noise measurements.  

• Larger professional stakeholders, e.g. petroleum activities, industry and mines are recommended to be subject to limit values and follow-up more in line with common practice in Western countries. 

• Limit values for indoor noise from outdoor sources are hardly relevant, e.g. due to commonly occurring poor sound insulation in building facades. 

• Typically, the distance between noise source and noise receiver is small – no reason to emphasize metrological conditions in assessments. This simplifies noise propagation calculations. 

• Uganda is close to equator – this leads to small seasonal variations in outdoor everyday life.  

• Noise is currently not a premise for allowing activities in the general environment, like loudspeakers, bars, etc. 

• Quantities to be measured should be implemented in affordable sound level meters – implying simple time-averaged and simple maximum levels instead of e.g. L_den and statistical npercent exceeded levels, L_n. 

• Single noisy events should be regulated. 

Outcome 

We quickly realised that noise in the general environment should preferable be regulated by restricting type of activities and time of day for the activities, rather than by limit values – the latter implying a regime of personnel qualified in noise measurements as well as their access to good sound level instruments. The proposed draft of the regulations thus contains descriptions of activities to be restricted. On the other hand: Noise and vibration made by professional stakeholders, which commonly are foreign, should be regulated by limit values – to be monitored either by themselves or by inspectors from the authorities. 

As already mentioned, Uganda has much biodiversity and many national parks and other protected areas. In some cases, there are industrial sites located within these protected areas, e.g. oil and gas fields near the shores of Lake Albert. Thus, the terrestrial and aquatic wildlife must be protected from potential damaging noise in the air and in the water, as well as potential damaging vibrations. Especially elephants are known to be highly sensitive to vibrations and low frequency sound. Of course, special attention must be paid to the endangered species in these dual-purpose areas. Such mixed zoning creates challenges contrasted to land use with e.g. industrial areas well separated from protected areas. 

The major topics to be addressed in the regulations are summarised in Table 1. In northern Europe it is not that common to have that many topics covered in noise and vibration regulations. As such, a multi-discipline approach to the task is needed here. Setting actual limit values for the different quantities represents another challenge. For some of the quantities, interim limit values are proposed in the regulations – awaiting future revisions after updated knowledge has become available. 

Table 1: Major topics required in regulations for noise and vibration in Uganda. 

Notes: 

¹⁾ Here free-field sound means free-field sound including ground effects like reflection, scattering and absorption. However, reflections from other surfaces, e.g. building facades, should not be included. 

²⁾ Sound pressure level re 1 µPa in water, in contrast to the common reference sound pressure in air: 20 µPa. 

³⁾ Sound exposure level re 1 µPa²·s. 

⁴⁾ T = duration of noise event [s]. 

⁵⁾ High peak pressure levels will damage tissue, swim bladders, etc. High exposure will disturb behaviour as well as having a potential for tissue damage. 

Status and Concluding Remarks 

• End of April 2024: A rather complete draft of the regulations is finalised. Norconsult work ends. 

• Early summer 2024: Cleansing the manuscript, etc., revision work in Ministry of Justice in Uganda. 

• Late 2024: The process of the regulations will most likely reach its final stages, hopefully ending with determination in the Ministry of Water and Environment in Uganda. 

One may ask: Is regulation of environmental noise and vibration a luxury phenomenon? Considering the sheer volume of studies of adverse effects of environmental noise worldwide the answer is clearly “no.”  

We sincerely hope that the new regulations will contribute to raising the level of consciousness on environmental noise and vibration in the Ugandan society – having impacts e.g. on spatial planning and lowering the threshold for discussions and justified complaints on noise. Hopefully, the regulations will step by step, lead to a more sustainable society in Uganda, where e.g. fewer children are awake at night, because the bar in the street is open around the clock. 

We also hope that a future expansion of I-INCE activities in Africa will contribute to raising the awareness of noise and vibration issues in the continent’s civil societies.  

Acknowledgements  

This work is based on an ongoing long-term collaboration between the Norwegian Environment Agency (NEA) and the National Environment Management Authority of Uganda (NEMA). The authors supported the Norwegian Environment Agency from the end of 2022 with professional assistance related to the content of the regulations.  

The authors would like to thank NEA and the team from NEMA for the interesting discussions on the various topics and for the trust they have given us in this work. 

This work has previously been presented at the Congress Inter-Noise 2024 in France August 2024. 

The positions in this article reflect only the viewpoint of its authors.