The Kenyan government's efforts to arrest the depletion of the country's forest and promote environmentally sustainable agriculture is receiving a big boost from the African Development Bank Group's Green Zones Development Support Project, which is financing a combination of conservation and economic activities for sustainable environment-friendly development.
Kenya's dependence on the natural environment is profound and the environment underpins most sectors, including agriculture and horticulture, tourism, wildlife, and energy. Eighty percent of the country's energy comes from wood and rural communities depend on this for their fuel wood. The country's closed forest cover (about 1.7% for indigenous forests) is the lowest in East Africa, and water has become a major constraint on agricultural production.
Against this background, the government and civil society have launched a series of environmental protection initiatives and remedial actions. Notable among these are the forest bill passed by the parliament in 2005 and the famous Green Belt Movement started by Nobel Laureate, Wangari Maathai, in 1977.
In the same vein, the Bank Group's US$ 37 million (UA 25.04 million) Green Zones Development Support Project loan approved on 12 October 2005 aims to achieve similar goals. The agreement was signed on 12 February 2006 and the loan became effective on 27 February 2006.
The project is anchored on the Bank's Agriculture and Rural Development Policy, with particular emphasis on natural resource management and environmental protection. It is in line with Kenya's Result-based Country Strategy Paper, designed to reduce vulnerability and improve equity through agricultural and rural development.
The project, implemented by the Nyayo Tea Zones Development Corporation (NTZDC) and the Kenya Forest Service (KFS), has four main components: Natural Forest Conservation; Buffer Belt Watershed Management; Support to Forest Adjacent Communities; and Project Coordination and Management.
So far, the achievements have been considerable. These include tea cultivation on 877 hectares of the 900 medium- and 1,500 long-term targets, respectively. It has also established a 2,924-ha fuel-wood plantation, out of the mid-term target of 3000 ha and overall target of 5000 ha. In addition, reforestation of some 468ha against mid- and long-term targets of 300 and 500h, respectively, were realized. Regarding natural forest rehabilitation, at least 5,846 ha have been rehabilitated against a mid-term target of 6,860 ha and overall project target of 11,400ha.
Task managers say they chose a participatory approach in addressing three major challenges:
Reforestation of degraded forest reserves and environmentally sensitive areas;
Planting tea in the forest belt in order to prevent encroachment into the forest areas while, at the same time, providing tea leaves as raw material to nearby tea factories;
Supporting community forestation programmes and sustainable livelihood initiatives for people residing adjacent to the forests in the project area.
On sustainable livelihood initiatives, the project is supporting various income-generating activities including: seedling production, forest conservation, fruit tree growing, woodlot establishment, bee-keeping, fish farming, dairy animals, poultry management as well as silk-worm and mushroom production, among others.
According to the task managers, four community projects are now complete and some communities are already deriving benefits. For example, the average income for beneficiary groups in the four projects has risen from some KShs 24,000 per annum to more than KShs 1,250,000 per annum.
At the household level, the income has risen from an average of KShs 1,000 per annum to an average of KShs 48,000 per household per year. Some of the completed income-generating activities are now providing beneficiaries with intended benefits and it is anticipated that average incomes will rise further.
Furthermore, communities adjacent to gazetted forests provide labour for project activities such as consolidation of tea buffer belts, establishment of fuel-wood plantations, restoration of environmental sensitive areas, natural forest rehabilitation, restoration of community hilltops and watersheds. The project spends KShs 8 million per month on casual labour.
Given climate change imperatives, the Kenya Green Zones Development Support Project stands out as a model of symbiosis for harmonious and sustainable co-existence between man, animals and plants in time and space.
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Felix Njoku
