, along with the International Council for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF)){kind=link}
Kenya: The team from the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), along with the International Council for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF), visited Kenya Forest Service Headquarters. The team was led by Deputy Director of Forest at FAO HQ, Ewald Rametsteiner. During their visit to Kenya, they also met with Peter Waweru, who is currently in charge of Forests Conservation & Management on behalf of Ag. CCF Alex Lemarkoko.
The discussion centred on FAO and KFS partnerships in forest conservation, climate change resilience, especially for forests adjacent communities and food security.
They also discussed support towards the development of the Ngong Road Forest Participatory Forest Management Plan. They noted that there is an urgent need to ensure carbon markets and subsequent financing benefits are realized by Forest resource adjacent communities.
The lack of modalities to make climate change finance work for key stakeholders and communities adjacent to forests was identified as a challenge that would need to be overcome to actualize benefits at grassroots levels.
Mr Waweru noted that efficient use of forest resources would provide better returns and contribute to food security, additional income streams, and increase resilience to climate change. The meeting was joined by Dr Benjamin Kinyili, James Mwangombe and Nairobi Regional Forest Conservator Joyce Nthuku from KFS and Jhony Zapata and Philip Kisoyani from FAO ICRAF.
Moreover, on the same day, the Kenya Forest Service (KFS), Forest Investment Facility (FIF) and Head of the Tree Nurseries Division, Jane Ndeti, delivered a presentation on the model of Kenya’s FIF during a country case plenary session on Day 1 of the ongoing conference on unlocking finance for smallholder forest and farm producers.
The session was aimed at sharing lessons with the global audience on the Service’s financing model, which was launched in 2017 and is currently being implemented in Kitui, Embu, Tharaka Nithi and Kericho Counties. The fund targets forestry and livestock enterprises and crop production.
The facility has so far supported 30 tree nurseries producing 3 million tree seedlings which translates to 3000Ha of tree planting and supporting 1167 livelihood projects across the four projects implementing Counties.
