Communities living adjacent to forests are crying foul, saying they are not supported despite the crucial role that they play.
Through their umbrella body- National Alliance for Community Forest Associations, forest-adjacent communities said authorities have totally failed them.
NACOFA chairman Gerald Ngatia said communities have helped the state rehabilitate the country’s forest resources.
“We have conserved for far too long. There are no proper plans to sustain community forest associations. CFAs are not facilitated to propagate seedlings and rehabilitate degraded areas,” Ngatia said.
Ngatia said community forest associations have been crucial in enhancing the country’s forest cover.
Recent results generated from the National Forest Resources Assessment 2021 showed the country has 5.2 million hectares of national forest cover, which represents 8.83 per cent of the total area.
The forest cover increased from 5.9 per cent in 2018 to 8.83 per cent in 2021, while the national tree cover stands at 12.13 per cent, above the constitutional target of 10 per cent.
The state intends to plant 15 billion trees in the next 10 years at a cost of Sh600 billion.
This means each year, the budget is about Sh60 billion.
The 15 billion tree campaign translates to 30 trees per Kenyan per year over the next 10 years.
The state hopes that by 2032, the country’s tree cover will have hit 30 per cent from the current 12.13 per cent.
Currently, there are 250 community forest associations across the country.
A registered CFA is under obligation to protect, conserve and manage the public forest in accordance with the approved management plan, and formulate and implement sustainable forest programmes.
They also protect sacred groves and protected trees, assist KFS in enforcing the provision of the forest laws, help in fire-fighting, and inform KFS of any developments, changes and occurrences which are critical for the conservation of biodiversity.
They also have user rights comprising of collection of medicinal herbs, harvesting of honey, harvesting of timber or fuel wood, grass harvesting and grazing and collection of forest produce for community-based industries.
Other user rights include ecotourism and recreational activities, scientific and educational activities, plantation establishments, development of community wood and non-wood forest-based industries and contacts to assist in carrying out specified forest operations.
The CFAs also benefit from Plantation Establishment and Livelihood Improvement Scheme (Pelis).
Pelis is a system in which KFS allows forest-adjacent communities, through CFAs the right to cultivate agricultural crops during the early stages of forest plantation establishment.
Cultivation is allowed to continue for 3 years until the tree canopy closes.
The PELIS scheme was meant to improve the economic gains of participating farmers while ensuring the success of planted trees.
In 2018, a task force that looked into forest management in the country noted that the scheme had; instead, led to considerable abuse and loss of forestland as many other illegal practices were camouflaged under its umbrella, including agricultural encroachment into the indigenous forest via plantations.
The outrage by the CFAs comes days after the state lifted a moratorium that had been imposed on logging.
Ngatia said the lifting of the moratorium can be beneficial.
However, CFAs also do not benefit.
Ngatia says during the harvesting of plantations, saw millers descend on all trees, leaving communities with nothing.
He said trucks ferrying the materials leave communities with impassable roads.