KENWEB is proud to announce that it has been accepted as a member of the ICCA Consortium http://www.iccaconsortium.org/

The ICCA consortium is an international organisation dedicated to promoting the appropriate recognition of and support to Indigenous Peoples’ and Community Conserved Areas and Territories. We believe, like walking on water lilies for this Black Crake, that the situation in Kenya is a difficult balancing act. Indigenous communities, with the exception of the Ogiek, have not really been officially recognised, the ethnic issue has been completely politicised and communal land rights are a very hot potato anyway. Many of the potential ICCAs are being gobbled up in all sorts of setups, sometimes with the backing of the green-grabbing type of conservation NGOs who are not beyond taking a few shortcuts around the free prior and informed consent by the concerned communities. In Kenya there is also a long tradition of “conservancies”, the governance of which is not always top notch, ranging from the exploitative, with virtually no benefits accruing to the community or only to a few individuals in it, and then all the way to the marvellously pure of heart but that lack means to implement crucial management interventions such as surveillance or securing their water rights. In addition, many of the world’s most famous protected areas have actually been established on non-formalised ICCAs and its dispossessed people have faced enormous difficulties in maintaining access to some of their most vital resources, including spiritual. With climate change making the fenced and state-controlled approach to biodiversity conservation increasingly irrelevant, there is recognition that networks of well-governed and appropriately supported ICCAs (with the wrong approach they can be totally wrecked in no time at all) are increasingly an avenue for the conservation of significant landscapes that integrate multiple uses. That also means the pressure is on from all sides to either convert them to single use from large-scale agriculture (irrigation, biofuels) to fortress conservation type areas. The money that some unscrupulous characters smell in REDD+ also brings out some of the worst behaviour in human society. It will always be hard to empower the powerless. So we need to tread carefully and ethically