Mau ‘can earn Kenya Sh4bn a year in carbon trade’

Kenya can make up to Sh10 billion per year in the international carbon trading market if water towers are conserved.

Henry Ndede, coordinator of the Kenya country programme at the United Nations Environment Programme, says the Mau Forest complex alone can earn Sh4 billion a year. “Major companies in the West and Asia would gladly pay for the forestland to compensate for the polluting effect of their activities back home,” he says.

Carbon trading is a practice where companies which exceed their emission limits buy credits from those who pollute less. The buyer is essentially charged for polluting while the seller is rewarded for reducing emissions. Mr Ndede says this is one of the many benefits restoration of the nation’s water towers can have.

Chopped down

“All players involved need to intensify their outreach efforts to impress on people the value of forests. Do the local communities see the forests solely as a source of trees to be chopped down?

Or do they also appreciate it as a source of medicine, a permanent source of water, a source of fresh air and a potential income earner in the field of eco-tourism?” he asked.

Mr Ndede concedes some of the environmental challenges the nation is facing are a result of global warming but the degradation of key water towers contributes to erratic rainfall patterns.

“The science is quite simple. As air rises from the Coast, which is at low altitude, it cools as it gets to higher ground. Over the Mau, that air meets wind from the Atlantic which blows over the Congo, evapotranspiration occurs and this results in rainfall.

Given the fact that 25 per cent of forest cover in the Mau is gone, you can extrapolate to say roughly a quarter of the rain you would expect is also gone,” he says. Mr Ndede said the restoration of the Mau forest will need to be followed by efforts to secure it.

He said UNEP was working with the Mau secretariat to help equip forest rangers with surveillance equipment and the agency will also cooperate with the government to help mark the boundaries of the forest.