Marking 10 years in conserving Karura

Approximately fifteen minutes from the Nairobi Central Business District lies the Karura Forest Reserve; a forest that has quickly become a nature gem and one of the most visited places in Nairobi. The value nature enthusiasts derive from this forest wouldn’t have been possible had it not been for the resilience of the Late Nobel Laureate Professor Wangari Maathai, and concerned residents neighbouring the forest who formed the Friends of Karura (FKF), a Community Forest Association.

As early as the 1900’s large parts of the forest were annexed by the British colonial government as sources of timber and firewood for the Uganda Railway. In 1932, Karura was gazetted as a forest reserve by the colonial government. At the time, the natural forest was thick with indigenous trees which take long to grow and mature. Unfortunately, this wasn’t a quality that augured well with the railway operators. Soon after, the indigenous trees, Muthiga, Mukinduri and Muhugu and were cut down in favour of exotic trees especially the Eucalyptus species and others because they matured faster.