Translate the tree planting drive into a robust economic activity

When the Jubilee government banned logging, it was to increase national forest cover to assure Kenya’s water supply security.

When the Kenya Kwanza government recently reinstated logging, it was to fix an economic problem of acute deficit of timber supply.

The two apparently conflicting decisions point to major environmental and economic opportunities that should catalyse Kenya to recreate forestry as a robust social-economic segment, guided by a sufficiently resourced implementation master plan.

In the 1960s and 1970s, I recall voluminous foliage covering most of Kenya, with hundreds of rivers and streams permanently full of clean water flowing from the water towers.

Foresters trained at the then-prestigious Londiani College professionally managed government forests, controlled commercial harvesting of trees, and promptly replanted replacement trees — actually using the shamba system.

Much of the forestry acreage has since given way to human settlement and agriculture, while underfunding has prevented sustainable replanting of government forests. Corruption also permitted the reckless harvesting of trees.

The most urgent justification for reforestation is the restoration and preservation of critical water towers to guarantee water security to assure food security and sustain hydropower generation.

For me, effective hydrology for water security comes ahead of climate carbon-sink justification for reforestation. Indeed I deem Africa to produce relatively small amounts of carbon compared with the offending Global North.

The second urgent focus should be commercial forestry to meet requirements for timber, paper, and fibre to reduce forex spending on imports while providing local jobs.

Commercial forestry should include private investors on private or leased public land, especially in areas that are not in competition with agriculture.

Indeed, government forests cannot on their own sustain commercial forestry, and should instead mainly focus on recreating water towers.

The revival of the paper industry should be planned on the basis of sustainable feedstock supply and should include bamboo.

The collapsed Webuye paper enterprise did not have a sustainable supply of trees and may have contributed to the massive deforestation of North Rift and Western counties.

The third target should be agro-forestry, including large-scale commercial export fruit farming (avocados, mangoes, macadamia), which adds significant acreage to national forest cover.

Also, to be targeted is small-scale agro-forestry in rural areas where trees are grown for household use (fruits, timber, and firewood).

Let us professionalise the ongoing tree planting campaign with clear targeted environmental and economic objectives, with the aim of benefiting from multilateral climate funding.

The writer is a petroleum consultant. [email protected]