By UN Environment
“Local communities have to be involved in decisions about forests that affect their livelihoods,” says Tecla Chumba, a Kenyan woman from the Lembus tribe and mother of four. She set up a community forest association and asked the Kenya Forest Service to give each member half an acre of land and tree seedlings that they could plant, alongside their own crops. Members would then return these plots after the trees have grown for three years.
This is called the “shamba system” or “plantations establishment for livelihood improvement scheme.” It is a way to afforest land where exotic trees have been cut for timber. The community benefits from being able to plant crops such as potatoes, tomatoes, beans, peas, maize and even grass for cow fodder in exchange for planting tree seedlings and taking care of the growing trees for three years. This agroforestry approach has set the expectation for local farmers to use indigenous traditional methods to kill insects and no insecticides, but rather cow dung and ashes. In return, the Kenya Forest Service gets a piece of land that has been reforested.
