4.7Sustainability -
Sustainability has been a major consideration throughout the development of this project. There are two key interlinked challenges to assuring sustainability.
-
Without this GEF intervention, there will be a continuing loss of globally significant biodiversity values in the West Evergreen/ Hill Forests of threatened Eastern Montane Hotspot. This would be manifest through the conversion of un-protected forests to permanent crop cultivation, including tea and smallholder shambas, and degradation of Forest Reserves. While the Government has taken big strides to address past maladministration in the Forest Sector by establishing a new Parastatal responsible to an independent Board for forest management, and a new Forest Act that updates legislation to improve, amongst other things, forest conservation, and provide for greater community involvement in forest management, a number of barriers are impeding efforts to address biodiversity loss.
-
The area of forest that is within a PA management category established to protect biodiversity is a small percentage of the overall forest landscape. The Project Alternative will establish a network of forest protected areas under a management category designed to protect biodiversity. This will incorporate priority production forests and unprotected areas. The planning framework, monitoring facilities, operational capacities and infrastructure will be emplaced, to ensure that PA authorities are able to fulfil their mandates in a coordinated and cost effective manner. The project will also address constraints pertaining to community participation in PA management, through the creation of community conservation areas in small forest patches and corridor areas and joint management of PA buffers.
-
What is clear from the PPG process and the lessons learned from previous projects is that simply focusing on livelihood support without accompanying governance structures that the project is likely to fail. Therefore sustainability is incorporated into the approach of this approach of this project by the three-pronged effect that is underlined in the project strategy. First, to provide the policy framework to enable the forest landscapes of Western Kenya to be managed under enhanced protected status which will afford greater protection to an increased area of forest cover. Tied into this is the engagement of local people not only in co-management of forest areas but also to be supported in livelihood enhancement activities that are tied into the sustainable management of forest reserves. Third, by providing increased support to the operational capacity of forest management, to ensure that long term management of the forests has a considerably improved system of governance, bringing forest management practices to a level which can be sustained through ongoing training and equipment provision, funded in the long term by a stronger, more engaged government structure, supported on the community level and invested in by an increasing, managed, private sector investment interest.
-
Climate change is likely to affect the distribution and abundance of both endemic and non-endemic species. The project has internalized this factor into design. See below a climate change adaptation implementation action plan to be followed during the project.
-
Climate change adaptation implementation action plan.
Needs / Issue
|
Adaptation Measures
|
Scope & Timing
|
Responsible
|
Protected Area network not climate proofed
|
Ensure connectivity between existing protected areas and avoid further fragmentation so that species / habitats have the opportunity to move under climate change scenarios.
Manage protected areas to supply vital ecosystem services, in particular water supply and quality regulation, through the curtailment of forest loss and management of fire risks and other threats undermining these ecosystem services.
|
Forests in Western Kenya under improved PA status in different formats. Timing: within the 5 years of project implementation.
|
KFS, KWS, NEMA with support of Nature Kenya
|
Carbon financing
|
Pilot testing of carbon financing mechanisms and likely implementation in the Kakamega Forest.
|
Site selection is a proposed 473 hectare area composed of two sites that would connect two main forest islands (Kakamega Forest Proper and Yala Forest). Timing to be confirmed, likely within project timeframe
|
Through KFS and NK engagement with Forest Again61 partnership
|
4.9Replication Strategy -
The Project incorporates good biodiversity management practices that have been demonstrated elsewhere. The main outcome of this project is a model that can be replicated throughout Kenya. With the participation of different stakeholders at different levels, it will be easier to share lessons and lobby for desired changes, spearheaded by officers from the different sectors of government. Based on demonstration that the various tools developed during an earlier project at three pilot sites are working in the new sites, will be critical for replication and will facilitate this process. It will be necessary to share information on benefits that communities have gained that have contributed to their well being. This will encourage replication in other areas more easily.
-
The project will undertake field delivery of Kenyan policies and laws. Work will be implemented both at the national level on the development of an agreed conservation strategy for the Montane Forests and on looking strategically on the protected area system for these forests. Work will also be undertaken at the landscape level to deliver tangible improvements in the protected area system at that level. Lessons learned at the field level will inform the development of the national strategy and will help build the protected area system for Montane Forests by involving communities. These lessons, and the agreed strategy, will provide as basis for actions at other key landscapes within the Eastern Montane Forests of Kenya.
-
Interventions at some of these landscapes are already receiving funding. Although these interventions are outside the scope of the co-finance of this project, they contribute additional opportunities for learning and scaling up the impact of the GEF project. Taken together this suite of investments and projects will be able to deliver significant improvements in the prospects for long term conservation in these forests. The results of this project will be widely replicable within the country and also elsewhere in the region, through a variety of media and through linkages with GoK and NGO campaigns.
-
Replication Implementation Action Plan
Component
|
Needs/Opportunities for Replication
|
Project Strategy for Replication
|
COMPONENT 1. Systemic and Institutional Capacities for Managing an Expanded and Rationalized PA Estate.
|
Gains in enhancing and increasing the PA status of western Kenyan forests, if successful, can be replicated for other ecoregional scale GEF projects globally where forest policy contexts are similar.
This component will also help build the capacity of GoK agencies and hence they will be able to replicate the enhanced capacity themselves and apply gains across Kenya’s forests.
|
Lessons from implementing the protected area systems approach in the Western Forests of Kenya will be documented, captured, and disseminated in technical papers and scientific products. The approach will also be promoted at relevant international meetings and technical protected area events. It is expected that the capacity build internally will be used to spread the lessons learned across the work of GoK and partners.
|
COMPONENT 2. Community management of PAs (JFM/CBNRM).
|
The work on the protected areas of Kenya will be of relevance to similar Montane forest landscapes in Africa and elsewhere. This component will also help build the capacity of the government agencies and hence they will be able to replicate the enhanced capacity themselves.
|
As with the above, the approach to replication will be to capture the detailed lessons learned and the results of implementing this component and to make these available as broadly as possible. It is expected that the capacity built internally will be used to spread the lessons learned relating to community engagement and co-management.
|
COMPONENT 3. Operational Capacities for PA Site Management.
|
This component will field test a number of operational support mechanisms which if successful can be applied to PA management not only across Kenya, but in other regional and global contexts with similar issues of governance and capacity at PA operational management level.
|
Detailed learning from this field projects will be fed back to the systems of Government in all relevant agencies to share lessons on gains in operational management capacity. Crucially, lessons learned from the landscapes focused on in this component will be able to be shared with other forest PAs including the Mau Forest Complex.
|
|
Yüklə 2.65 Mb.