Save Lamu Forum on Human and Environmental Rights Monitoring

On Saturday October 5th Steph Booker and Maya Sikand from Natural Justice presented at a Forum hosted by Save Lamu on Human and Environmental Rights Monitoring in Lamu Town. Participants of the meeting included members of the Lamu community from the Islands and Mainland as well as representatives from communities along the LAPSSET corridor. 

Natural Justice gave a presentation on 'What is Human and Environmental Rights Monitoring?'. Participants then separated into groups according to region, and began documenting changes they have witnessed in their areas. This was an important first step in collecting information, and understanding what sort of questions are asked during human rights monitoring. It is hoped that this forum is the beginning of a wider effort at human rights monitoring training for community organisations along the LAPSSET corridor. Such documentation is an important tool when making a case about human or environmental rights abuses against companies or the government.

Presentations were also made by Sarah Singh from Accountability Counsel and Mohammed Ramadhan from the Kenyan National Commission on Human Rights on national and international grievance mechanisms. Save Lamu have initiated creative ways to bring all the information about changes in the communities to one central place, for example through text messages.

Read More

Indigenous Pollinators: Honey and Harmony

From the 25-26th of September one of Natural Justice’s partner organizations in Kenya, Kivulini Trust co-hosted an Indigenous Pollinators Network Workshop in Nairobi, together with the FAO and Indigenous Partnership for Agrobiodiversity and Food Sovereignty.

The objective of the workshop was to establish a network of indigenous communities knowledgeable of and supportive towards pollinators. A similar workshop was held last month in India, where an Indigenous Pollinators Network has been formed. Through such a network communities can share best practices and provide support to each other. Another goal of the workshop was to create awareness of the many different pollinators that exist, and their importance.

What is a pollinator?

The workshop commenced with a presentation by pollination expert Dr. Mary Gikungu from the National Museums of Kenya on what is a pollinator? Most of us think only of bees – and honeybees at that – when we hear the word pollinator. In fact, honeybees account for only a tiny fraction of the pollinators that exist – there are many other species of bees, as well as birds, butterflies, bats and other insects that provide the world with essential pollination services. In case it has been a while since you took a biology class – pollinators are important because without them most plants would not be able to reproduce – which would mean no food, or other plant materials, so important for humans and the environment.

Attendees of the workshop included indigenous communities from across Kenya, such as the Enderois, the Ogiek and the El Molo communities. There was someone working with the Boni community along the coast, women from West Pokot and several people who had come from as far away as Marsabit – a full two day journey away. The workshop created a very good space for these community members to interact and discuss issues together, facilitation was bilingual in Kiswahili and English, there were plenty of break-out group sessions and the attitude amongst everybody present was that all the participants have a lot of valuable knowledge to share, which created a space where everybody felt comfortable speaking.

Most participants had not thought much about pollinators other than honeybees before. This presented a challenge when discussing a question such as ‘What are other pollinators you see in your area?’ Perhaps there was a communication difficulty in explaining the question, or the word ‘pollinator’, which is new to most people. Or maybe people understandably notice bees more, and not other pollinators, because bees produce honey. Certainly, all of the community members present possessed rich knowledge of their environments. Whether or not this knowledge is communicable through Western scientific terms like ‘pollinator’ is a challenge. Perhaps in using these concepts as the basis for a network we are already shifting the way knowledge is conceived.

All the attendees were very knowledgeable about beekeeping in their different environments. It was exciting to see the connections form as a participant spoke about a tree in his region that bees prefer, and someone else from another place recognized the description but knew the same tree by another name in her own language. She shared with the other participants useful information about that tree that others didn’t know. Beekeeping is important for all of these communities as income generation, a source of nutrition and medicine and for symbolic purposes. For example, for many a cup of honey is included in bride payments.

The Ogiek community brought up Biocultural Community Protocols as a tool for the communities present to protect their knowledge about bees and other pollinators. They shared with the others what a BCP is and how it can be of use in documenting and protecting indigenous knowledge and practices. This led to a discussion on ‘mapping your own lands before someone else does’, particularly for the communities to be affected by the LAPSSET project. Many participants articulated that a challenge they face is access to land. Since mapping land and community resources was identified as a useful future exercise, BCPs might be of further use here as well.

Read More

LAPSSET Dialogue Meeting in Nairobi

On 15 February 2013, Gino Cocchiaro (Natural Justice) attended a stakeholder dialogue meeting on the on-going plans and sharing of updates on the implementation of the Lamu Port and Lamu Southern Sudan-Ethiopia Transport Corridor (LAPSSET) in Nairobi, Kenya. The meeting was facilitated by Save Lamu and included over 50 participants from communities affected by LAPSSET, national civil society organisations, multinational organisations and Kenyan government agencies. The meeting resulted in the drafting and adoption of a statement on the aspirations and concerns of communities affected by LAPSSET projects. 

From the statement, “As communities that have long been disenfranchised, and that are in dire need of development, we commend the Kenyan government for its commitment to upgrading and modernising the country’s infrastructure as per the proposed Lamu Port, South-Sudan, Ethiopia Transport (LAPSSET) Corridor outlined in the Government of Kenya’s 'Vision 2030'. We appreciate the need for connecting communities along the northern corridor to facilitate national and international trade. However, we are deeply concerned by the lack of community consultation and transparency in the implementation of the project and hereby wish to express our concerns.” 

Read more about the meeting here. Download the community statement here.

Read More