Combating Desertification in Kenya - Combating Desertification in Asia, Africa and the Middle East - page 143

can lead to successful rehabilitation of some ecosystem services and hence reduce
poverty. Some success stories have been observed; for example, farmers in the
Machakos (Kenya) restored degraded lands. This was achieved through access
to markets, off-farm income, and technologies that increased land and labor
productivity faster than population growth.
In Kenya the use of payments for ecosystem services, mostly around the coun-
try's reserves and parks—where people live close to wildlife—is providing a stable,
reliable and predicable source of income to pastoralists with the double advantage
of reducing poverty and protecting wildlife. In many sites where payments for
ecosystem services have be piloted successfully, local-level institutions have played
a significant role in enabling communities to self-govern and are supported by
flexible land-use and governance systems that respect the communal land ownership
patterns that have traditionally existed in these areas. Payments to livestock herders
for the ecosystem services generated through their land uses are currently being
made in lands adjacent to Kenya's famous Masai Mara National Reserve, in the
southwest of the country, and in the Kitengela wildlife dispersal area to the south of
Nairobi National Park.
In both areas, Maasai people have formed 'eco-conservancies' to protect their
grazing areas for livestock and wildlife alike. In cases where these conditions are
not met, efforts to rehabilitate fail. Box 7.1 sets out specific actions taken by both
governments and local people. With all the projects listed, lack of funds is the major
constraint.
Box 7.1: Actions Taken at National and Local Level That Lead to Situa-
tion Betterment
Projects at National level
1. Establishment of an environmental information centre.
A preliminary proposal was prepared, funded by UNSO and UNEP. More
recently support has come from the East African Biodiversity Project.
2. Monitoring desertification in Kenya dry lands.
3. Establishment of radio programs. It is intended to expand this to television.
4. Integrated development of range farming and wildlife management in the
pastoralist divisions. Using livestock as a tool to help rehabilitate degraded
land (Northern Rangelands (Samburu))
Activities at local Community level
1. Reinforcement of rangeland areas with legumes
2. Grasslands should be harvested when they are most nutritive and stored as
high quality hay for dry season feeding
3. Grazing reserves should be established
(continued)