Impact of the urban development of the Mingoa River watershed on the Municipal Lake of Yaoundé, Cameroon

10 p.International audienceCurrently, Africa is the less urbanized region in the world. But that trend will change by 2020. Their urban development and globalization have promoted developed countries lifestyle, despite poverty. That means the use of chemicals. Sanitation issues have led to the discharge of untreated wastewater, and as a result, to the emission of persistent pollutants, harmful for human health and for the aquatic environment. Chemicals leading role in economy and in the improvement of life quality has to be weight against their potential negative impacts. The risk represented by these impacts makes chemicals management, an issue of sustainable development. According to a UNEP report, that topic is little documented in Africa. Our work aims at reconstructing an historical link between the urban development of the Mingoa River watershed and the Municipal Lake organic pollution. Thus, we are going to examine the sedimentary compartment using pollutants as tracers. Given that we have not started yet the laboratory work, this article is an introduction to the study