Yesterday I sat down for a chat with Athumani Fadhili Ali, the secretary of Friends of Shimoni Forest (FSF), and some absolutely incredible and momentous news was revealed to me! He had spent the last five hours in discussions with the Permanent Secretary to the Minister of Forests and Wildlife, concerning the plight of Shimoni forest!
I was speechless and massively excited, because as it turns out, the Permanent Secretary had come all the way down to Shimoni specifically to talk to Athumani about the issues concerning the communities, and community conservation, of which the forest is a major part.
A hotel being built on a coastal plot
Athumani had described to him all of the damage being done in the forest, and the alarming rate at which it was happening. He talked about the issues of illegal loggers and their power saws, the charcoal burning, and the huge development occurring on the coastal plots. He also discussed the efforts of Friends of Shimoni Forest and other community members, who are doing their best to raise awareness amongst the communities, and halt the irreversible damage being done.
Barbed wire fences that now surround many plots that are being levelled
The Permanent Secretary was shocked and concerned by what he heard, and offered to raise the issue with the relevant authorities, and even the Minister himself! This is such an incredible turn out, and we couldn’t really have asked for a better audience to discuss these issues with, and the assistance he could provide could potentially change the tides of this ongoing battle.
An earth-mound kiln charcoal pit
What the Permanent Secretary asked for ASAP, were all of the reports that FSF and GVI have ever written and submitted, so he could get a better understanding of the issues and have some hard data with which to argue our case.
The results of a power saw. Trees are often cut down badly, and therefore simply left.
We are rushing to compile all of this information and get it to Athumani, so he can pass it on. We’re all very excited by this, and we will let you know as soon as we hear anything!
Keep your fingers crossed for us!
To help support Friends of Shimoni Forest and the work they are doing, please visit www.justgiving/shimoni
4 Comments
Congratulations guys! This is truly good news.
The Charcoal Trade in Kenya: An Untold Story of Billions (of Shillings!)
(the following is from the diary of a kenyan ‘stovie’. E&O.E applied, but its all in the ball park)
In the last 15 or so years, Kenya has seen the charcoal industry become highly demonized, mostly through ignorance, by almost all the people who could instead lead the way in effecting a simple solution instead of repeatedly regurgitating the well worn ‘apocalyptic-end-of-days’ of our forests from the so called greedy itinerant charcoal burner. Key in point is that this informal biomass energy industry is one of our backbone foreign exchange savers in energy (kerosene, LPG Gas), it is one of the cheapest and most cost beneficial ways of clearing virgin land for agriculture and when correctly managed can be a complete and sustainable system that has vast benefits for both our social, economic and environmental health.
When one considers that a typical bag of charcoal being used in Nairobi costing upwards of 900ksh started off costing 200ksh, questions as to where the 150% gross profit increase comes from and why trees are not being replanted are raised, these questions can be summarized in one word by our most popular Kenyan pastime of the national unsustainable business model….corruption.
And as is well documented and known, this informal energy industry is worth upwards of 30 Billion Shillings a year. This means that between consumer and producer any manner of what we can term irregular cash transactions are occurring, this short essay barely scrapes the very tip of a green iceberg made of good old cash! *All research has been garnered through personal experience and word of mouth from people directly involved in the trade.
To put it into a bit more perspective we must take a closer look from the grassroots level, a view from the level of the ankles of giants. Charcoal is sometimes ‘taxed’ over 12 times but typically only about 6 different ‘players’ are engaged in energy Mafioso activity.
Bribes are initially taken first from the charcoal maker, then the transporter and then the retailer. At the beginning is the Community Scout, this is a member of the community who receives a stipend from a local government officer to be the ‘ears’ on the ground and who in turn is usually the first to come across charcoal makers on private or public land. When this happens the charcoal makers have by this stage already expended considerable effort felling and processing the tree and they may have the earth kiln lit, and well knowing that their trade and lot in life lacks any justice, they typically come to some sort of “quick arrangement” with the scout, a little cash on the spot or if they know one another a small future debt upon sale of the charcoal.
Then come the men on the ground in uniforms, the A.P’s or the K.W.S or the K.F.S rangers, they typically extort money at a much higher rate than the community scouts. They know that they are the LAW, they do have guns, they typically possess a worldlier outlook than the Community Scout and because they usually have a much more sophisticated palate for the finer things in life they typically organize a payout that can eat up to 20% of the charcoal makers’ profit.
Once the charcoal maker has cleared his obligations to the goons on the ground and has packed his charcoal in gunny bags the transporter comes onto the scene. For the larger urban markets where most bush charcoal is destined, the charcoal is either transported by donkey or bicycle to trading centers and stored awaiting a lorry or if there is enough volume to warrant it the lorry goes to the site and collects. On private land this can be done in a much more transparent manner, in the daytime to be exact, but on Trust or other public land they tend to do it at night to avoid the men with uniforms. Once loaded (the typical lorry can carry 300 bags of hardwood charcoal valued at app. 90,000kshs *farm gate price of 300ksh per bag and the load can be sold in town at 225,000kshs *700ksh per bag at a rough profit of 135,000ksh) they have to obtain a Transport Permit.
The difficulty of obtaining this goods movement permit varies according to local by-laws, nepotism and the price of the bribe to obtain it. This can be anywhere from 20,000ksh to 40,000ksh paid directly to the District Forest Officer who then remits a portion of this payout to their superiors or other potential problem makers. Even being able to establish a ‘good’ connection with the D.F.O requires working ones way through the maze of hands to be greased to get into his or her office, to pay for audience it’s called.
If Cesar is not rendered his dues this Permit is not obtained and the lorry will not even begin its journey and risks having all the cargo confiscated immediately, once the permit is obtained the costliest part of the endeavor is undertaken.
A trip on the highway of the hyenas leads the transporter being pulled over at every roadblock to produce (1.) the permit and (2.) the bribe. This is generally under 1000kshs at each stop but the transporter may have to make up to 10 stops between point a-b.
Once the charcoal has reached its destination, it is either sold in bulk to restaurants, schools, nyama choma joints etc. or sold to the retailers who then break down the bags in varying small quantities for roadside and market sale. It is the small scale retailer who bears the brunt of paying out bribes. Council Askaris may insist on an ‘extra’ day hawker’s license and cartels extort protection money.
Some solutions to stopping this gross cycle of corruption are already outlined in the 2008 Charcoal Regulation Draft by The Kenya Forestry Service by implementing an enabling policy framework that can guide, license and provide a favorable business environment for private bioenergy-afforestation efforts. This coupled with increasing widespread use and manufacture of improved energy saving stoves can produce thousands of long term employment opportunities and will encourage market driven environmental conservation by giving higher monetary returns through increased value addition to biomass energy at the farm gate. And of course with the proper dissemination and training more people will be able to plant, sustainably harvest and manufacture their own small-batch charcoal for domestic use which in turn will greatly reduce demand on remaining forests and a substantial amount of bribes.
Hi Vutakwaraha,
Firstly thank you so much for an incredibly interesting and thought provoking extract. I always knew the charcoal industry was a complex minefield, but did not realise the extent to which it went. It was extremely interesting to read.
I would like to ask a couple of questions, and would love to hear your thoughts;
I would agree that charcoal burning is one of the cheapest and cost beneficial ways to clear “virgin land”, but what exactly is meant by virgin land? Would that include all untouched areas of land such as forests, woodlands and intermediary habitats?
You mention the “‘apocalyptic-end-of-days’ of our forests”. Is that not true? Kenya remains with a mere fraction of its former area of forests. Not only is this having disasterous effects on Kenya’s wildlife, but it is also upsetting key processes such as water catchement (and therefore entire water cycles), soil retention and fertility. This is very dangerous ground to be on, especially when millions of people in Kenya are suffering sever droughts as it is.
And for example coastal forests, are critical habitats for countless numbers of endemic species, as well as protecting near-shore reefs and fish populations from soil erosion. And considering 98% of people living in these coastal areas are fishermen, smothered reefs and decimated fish populations are life-threatening.
I agree that not all charcoal burning is evil, or conducted by “greedy itinerant charcoal burners”, but it seems to me that justifying the destruction of what few forest patches remain in this country, on the grounds of saving money in foreign exchange, is a slightly bizarre take on what Kenya’s priorities should be.
I would also be interested to find out how charcoal burning using such areas of land can be beneficial for environmental health?
Thanks again for your input, I hope to hear from you soon.
Kind regards,
Matt
As the old wise ones would say with a smirk, virgin land is that which has never felt the thrust of a ho:)
In the city even(kibera’s organic gardens) or in new places where nomadic pastoralists are settling down. i.e Kilgoris and maize and Moitanic Maasai.
And with the end of days thing about forests in Kenya, try find a Newspaper from 1985, what Janis joplin said about not knowing ‘what you got till its gone’ comes to mind. Now that our forests are almost gone, we as a nation seem to be finaly aware of the importance of trees etc.(ie the Rhino Ark Fence completion, small holder agroforestry plots, the whole Mau politicking).
It is a sad sad thing that it took this long and has brought us so close to the brink to relize the importance of good forest management in Kenya but if you read about the USA, Canada, Norway, Swedon, Japan, Finlands experiance with managing thier forests over the last 500 or so years a bright light of hope is there. They all had decimated thier forests at one time and now all, by virtues of their success in reafforestation are models of what can be done in kenya in the next few lifetimes if we really focus on large scale planting.
The energy potential in converting dry and arid lands into mixed use pasture and lets call it black gold (acacia trees) is huge. Even in coastel areas, google ‘Thailand, charcoal, mangroves’ they are a model sustainable charcoal system. To think if we planted enough, lets say for all our domestic energy, and building needs, we could even export charcoal (energy) to the middle east for grilled lamb!
Charcoal/firewood as an energy source to me seems like a endless solar energy battery. With photosysthesis bieng what it is, all we have to do is replant what we cut and then some.With good guidelines and long term planning of course.
And with trees providing so many ecological trickle down effects, soil rentention, bird/wildlife habitat, bee forage, CO2 sinks, shade etc that are not eaisly quantafiably, teaching people that planting trees is a gaurenteed source of big money..yes cash money….is a sure fire eye opener to land holders.
I personnaly dont consider anything inherinatly evil or any one inherinatly greedy, but what is happining with oil in sand shale in Canada, and the sheer volume of bloodletting in the middle east, the destruction of the Iraqi Marshes and the Niger Delta Ecosystem, lets just keep praying they dont find oil in Kenya, cos then we wil really have problems!
Look at Chinas efforts in the field of ariel seeding on th e mongol steppes, mimicing nature in a most successfull way!
We have a long way to go in Kenya, but the best oppertunities in the world usaly start out as a mountain of a challange…sooo….work smart, not hard.
Keep up the good work!