KASIGAU, KENYA
THE PROBLEM
For years, the land between Tsavo East and Tsavo West National parks in Kenya served both as home to a slowly failing cattle ranch and as the main migration corridor for local wildlife moving between the two National Parks. When we first encountered Rukinga, the community and the wildlife were at odds. Rukinga was a bruised, balding land, barren of wildlife. Cattle had grazed the fields into dust, poachers slipped on and off the ranch with ease, and trees were being clear cut along the area’s critical rainwater basin.
THE SOLUTION
In 1998 the local community supported our plan to establish the Rukinga Wildlife Sanctuary that covers 80,000 acres of forest. We established a community works project so local residents had an alternative income stream in place of poaching and clear cutting. We brought on locally hired rangers and trained them to be wilderness guardians. We convinced the owners of the cattle to remove the cattle from the land to reduce conflict over resources.
SCORECARD
The protection area has now expanded to over 500,000 acres, which will offset 1 million tons of CO2 emissions per year for the next 30 years. With the dryland Acacia-Commiphora forest under our protection and its original biodiversity restored, the Kasigau Corridor REDD project was awarded the Gold level status by the Community and Biodiversity Standard for exceptional biodiversity and climate benefits. The project area is home to a fantastic diversity of over 50 species of large mammals, more than 20 species of bats and over 300 species of birds and important populations of IUCN Red List species such as; Grevy's Zebra, Cheetah, Lion, African Wild Dog as well as over 2,000 African elephants. Now that scores highly for the future of planet earth.
There are six key elements to the Wildlife Work's Kasigau project that make it a successful model. The foundation of it all is job creation.
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Jobs supporting education [children's education, conservation education, community outreach about our projects]
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Jobs protecting wildlife [rangers and eco tourism]
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Jobs helping farmers [jajoba and chili project]
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Jobs growing trees [seedling program, green charcoal project]
Click on icons and images below for stories from the field.
Wildlife Works' expertise in and access to the global carbon market empowers the local community of the Kasigau Corridor region in Southeast Kenya with long-term jobs that replace unsustainable sources of income such as poaching, subsistence agriculture and illegal tree harvesting.
In an area where wildlife and human survival are at odds, we have found success in a market-driven solution to wildlife conservation.
In partnership with the forest community and land owners, Wildlife Works protects over 500,000 acres of dryland forest with over 11,000 wild elephants that live in this ecosystem (2000+ of those elephants call Rukinga their permanent home). We distribute funding for social programs that impact over 116,000 local people. All this is possible with the jobs we sustain through the sale of our products. Read wildlife rescue stories >>
Wildlife Works Factory employs over 70 locally hired workers. Wildlife Works Carbon employs an additional 300+ locally hired team members as rangers, community outreach officers, green house farmers, shop technicians, builders and more. We also employ local women's groups to produce crafts. Wildlife Works is the third largest employer in our county. Meet some of our employees>>
We provide access to global sales channels for handicrafts made by 1200+ women. 30% of our workforce is female, many of whom are managers and rangers, roles typically reserved for men in the region. We conduct company-wide anti-harassment training and have an equity and diversity policy.
Over 12,000 students have received scholarships totaling over $530,000.
Our sustainable charcoal team has produced tens of thousands of kgs of eco-charcoal without cutting down a single tree and are developing sales channels to increase its distribution. Eight permanent staff manually process 850-1,274 0.5kg briquettes/week.
Carbon revenues have funded the completion of 31 water project that improve water access to over 50,000 people.
Technical Project Documents
Project verification is renewed on average every year. Below is the latest Monitoring & Implementation Report in addition to the Project Documents.
The Kasigau Corridor REDD Project Phase II: The Community Ranches
The Kasigau Corridor
REDD Project Phase II
Monitoring & Implementation Reports
Find all Project Documents on Verra
The Kasigau Corridor
REDD Project Phase II:
The Community Ranches PDD
Project Design Document
Published December, 2011
The Kasigau Corridor
REDD Project Phase II:
The Community Ranches PD
VCS Project Description
Published May, 2011
The Kasigau Corridor
REDD Project Phase I
Monitoring & Implementation Reports
Find all Project Documents on Verra
The Kasigau Corridor
REDD+ Project Phase I:
Rukinga PDD
Project Design Document
Published December, 2008
The Kasigau Corridor
REDD+ Project Phase I:
Rukinga
VCS Project Description
Published January, 2011
The Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project Phase I: Rukinga