discuss the fate of forests in kenya and explain what the kenya government can do to mitigate on diminishing forests cover in the country
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Explanation:
Extent and Distribution of Indigenous Natural Forests
The latest inventory done in 1994 by Kenya Indigenous Forest Conservation Programme (KIFCON) came up with a differentiation between two types of forest cover. The total indigenous forest cover in gazetted forest areas was estimated by KIFCON (Wass, 1994), to be 1.06 million ha (excluding the mangrove forests along the coastline), while the area of indigenous closed canopy forest outside the gazetted forests was estimated to be 180,000 ha (0.18 million ha). Besides the gazetted forests, the country has a total of about 37.6 million ha of natural woody vegetation consisting of 2.1 million ha of woodlands, 24.8 million ha of bush-lands and 10.7 million ha of wooded grasslands.
Most of the closed canopy forests are concentrated in the high and medium potential zones of Kenya where, incidentally, the human population and agricultural production are also concentrated; hence there is potential conflict between closed canopy forest and agriculture. Within the arid and semi-arid zones, closed forests are fewer and are found concentrated mainly on isolated mountain ranges and along river courses, both permanent and seasonal, with the rest of this zone being composed of woodlands, bush-lands and wooded grasslands.
An extensive cover of mangrove forests are found along the coastline, which is estimated to total 54,355 ha (0.54 million ha.), a figure which was not included in the national forest cover estimated by KIFCON (Wass, 1994).
Current Status of Natural Forest Management
The management of the natural forests and that of the forest resource in general is governed by the national forest policy which is implemented mainly by the Forest Department, since most forest land falls under its jurisdiction as gazetted forest reserve. The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) has management responsibility for all indigenous forests falling within national parks, national reserves and game sanctuaries. These two organisations recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for joint management of selected indigenous forests of particular importance. In addition to the above gazetted categories of forests, other natural forests are found falling under trust lands, lands held in trust for the local people under the jurisdiction of the local authorities commonly known as County Councils. These forests are managed by the local county councils and in some cases with assistance of the Forest Department and KWS. Forests falling within gazetted national monuments are managed by the National Museums of Kenya (NMK).
Following a presidential decree in 1985 that banned commercial exploitation of natural forests, there is no formal indigenous forest management in Kenya to date. In the recent past however, other forms of non-traditional forest management are emerging based on non-extractive uses. The current policy initiative has also proposed participatory forest management strategies based on benefit sharing, with the forest adjacent communities.
In general terms, the national parks and reserves enjoy stronger political support in conservation than gazetted forest reserves where management is low keyed. The Forest Department at the moment lacks adequate funding and other resources for effective management of the forest resources. Hence, most of the natural forests are currently facing a lot of threat from human activity that include illegal encroachment, excisions, charcoal burning, poaching of timber and other forest products and forest fires originating from adjacent farmlands. If this trend persists it is expected that the total area under national forest will decline substantially to give way to agricultural activities. This portends a catastrophe in view of this limited resource and its direct/indirect linkage with agricultural activities.
Over-exploitation and lack of proper management is also rampant in most of the forests falling under the local authorities in trust lands, some of which are faced with threat of extinction. A few of the small parcels of natural forests especially at the coast (Kaya forests) have been preserved by the local communities for religious and other ceremonial purposes who exert a lot of traditional control over their use. Their future lies to a large extent in the hands of these communities. Other problems facing the conservation and management of indigenous forests involve the following:
Forest excisions for human settlement and agriculture as a result of high population pressure;
Lack of proper management plans for most of the forest reserves
Forest research has been focusing on plantation forestry and indigenous forests have largely been overlooked:
Lack of involvement of adjacent communities and other stakeholders in conservation and management
Lack of information on the location,
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