{"id":16126,"date":"2024-03-21T11:03:25","date_gmt":"2024-03-21T11:03:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/index.php\/2024\/03\/21\/empower-forest-communities-to-champion-fight-against-climate-change\/"},"modified":"2024-03-21T11:03:25","modified_gmt":"2024-03-21T11:03:25","slug":"empower-forest-communities-to-champion-fight-against-climate-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/empower-forest-communities-to-champion-fight-against-climate-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Empower Forest Communities to Champion Fight against Climate Change"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Geoffrey Mwangi Wambugu<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Today marks the International Day of Forests and sadly we celebrate the day when human activities are destroying the world\u2019s forests at an unprecedented rate, despite being vital to supporting life on Earth.<\/p>\n

Sub-Saharan African countries whose lives and economies are tied closely to land, and the environment have experienced substantial forest cover loss.<\/p>\n

Due to the increasing human population coupled with the declining state of the environment including climate change, forest communities have been faced with few livelihood options, leading them to opt for illegal logging, and conversion of forests to cropland and settlements.<\/p>\n

These activities have led to a decline in forest cover and are associated with other environmentally degrading activities such as wildfires.<\/p>\n

Forests provide an array of benefits and ecosystem services, including water provision, food, medicine, shelter, energy, and fuelwood for millions of people in this region. Forest loss and degradation lead to socio-economic losses, especially the loss of the said benefits and ecosystem services.<\/p>\n

Forests are also important for biodiversity conservation and climate change mitigation.\u00a0 According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, 22.7 percent or about 674,419,000 ha of Africa is forested.<\/p>\n

Closer home, Kenya is among the countries in the world with a forest cover of less than 10 percent of the total land mass. The national forest cover currently stands at about seven percent falling short of the constitutionally required threshold of 10 percent tree cover.<\/a><\/p>\n

Last September, African leaders parleyed in Nairobi for the Africa Climate Summit and, among many other recommendations, emphasized the need for nature-based solutions to climate change mitigation and adaptation.<\/p>\n

We are in dire straits, and the picture is not rosy. Continued forest loss further aggravates the triple planetary crisis of biodiversity, pollution, and climate change.\u00a0 The world is currently far from reaching its climate targets, with temperatures steadily heading towards almost 3\u00b0C of warming compared to pre-industrial levels.<\/p>\n

Vulnerability to climate shocks due to rising global temperatures has become the norm in the region, resulting in dire economic consequences from the recent droughts and floods that have plagued the region.<\/p>\n

Forests play a large role in our ability to fight the vagaries of climate change because of the massive amount of carbon they emit when they\u2019re degraded or cleared. Higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are disrupting natural weather patterns, causing harm to the Earth\u2019s climate.<\/p>\n

To mitigate against this dire situation, countries have already adopted the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, popularly known as \u2018REDD\u2019+ framework to protect forests as part of the Paris Agreement which will help in reducing human pressure on forests that result in greenhouse gas emissions at the national level.<\/p>\n

The framework that is benefiting millions of communities across the globe is a conservation system designed to preserve and protect forests by making them worth more alive than dead \u2013 and is a critical solution for tackling the climate emergency.\u200b<\/p>\n

For the framework to sustainably work, indigenous people and local communities, who are unduly affected by climate change should be empowered to be the champions of REDD+ and should be a priority issue as a mechanism for providing compensation in return for their forest protection efforts.<\/p>\n

For centuries, they have protected forests that provide their very basic needs-, homes, sources of food, and ceremonial sites. As the world heats up, they stand as the last defenders.<\/p>\n

Governments, the private sector, and non-governmental organizations are obliged to partner with forest communities by developing forest conservation projects that safeguard the most biodiverse ecosystems on Earth. For example, the success of such an approach is based on ensuring forest communities get financial payment for keeping their forests intact.<\/p>\n

By protecting the forest and earning revenue from carbon credit sales, communities\u2019 payment comes in the form of unprecedented funding for jobs and infrastructure, and direct revenue for social programs, health care, education, and other forest and wildlife-friendly development.<\/p>\n

Before starting any project, it is vital to ensure that the process is community-oriented, with the meaningful participation of all stakeholders. This includes landowners, local communities, marginalized groups, disabled individuals, and the youth. By adopting such an approach, all parties will be actively involved in securing food security and a better livelihood for everyone.<\/p>\n

To illustrate this, two decades ago, Wildlife Works delivered the world\u2019s first certified Kasigau REDD+ Project which protects over 200,000 hectares of dryland forest for a diverse population of endangered wildlife that also co-exist with humans.<\/p>\n

The successful model in Taita Taveta County offers a market-based solution that embeds community development into wildlife conservation. So far, the project has enabled about 100,000 people to access clean water, 30,000 students to access education through scholarships, and employment to over 400 people.<\/p>\n

Accelerating the transition to carbon neutrality and creating resilient economies and sustainable landscapes can be achieved by enabling both indigenous and local people to be at the forefront of protecting forests.<\/p>\n

Geoffrey Mwangi Wambugu is a Senior Research Scientist at Wildlife Works <\/em><\/strong><\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Geoffrey Mwangi Wambugu Today marks the International Day of Forests and sadly we celebrate the day when human activities are destroying the world\u2019s forests at an unprecedented rate, despite being vital to supporting life on Earth. Sub-Saharan African countries whose lives and economies are tied closely to land, and the environment have experienced substantial […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16126\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}