The restoration of Kakamega forest has received a major boost from the Kakamega Forest Heritage Foundation that is facilitating the restoration and conservation of deforested areas in the rain forest.
The Foundation has established a Conservation Fund, whose purpose is to facilitate the restoration and conservation of the Forest.
Through the conservation fund, the Foundation has distributed over 30,000 seedlings of both exotic and indigenous species to schools, churches, mosques and to individuals to establish woodlots on their lands that upon maturity would provide both firewood and timber for own use to reduce the need and propensity of raiding the forest for those needs.
The Fund has also, in collaboration with the Kenya Forest Service (KFS) adopted over 100 hectares of the deforested area to restore and rehabilitate with strictly indigenous seedlings in an attempt to restore the forest to its original pristine condition.
The organization is working in partnership with Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa, (AGRA), Kenya Forestry Research Institute (KEFRI), Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO), Kenya Prisons and The Department of Defense, Kenya Forestry Service (KFS).
Others are the Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Kenya(ICIPAK), Kenya Commercial Bank, World Rally Championship (WRC), Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology (MMUST), local forest associations and local schools.
The Foundation was established in 2015 as a charitable organization with the objective of complimenting the efforts of the Government of Kenya of restoring and conserving the Kakamega Forest for the welfare of the forest ecosystem.
Ahead of a major planting exercise to be presided over by the Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi at Iloro, Shinyalu sub-county, Kakamega County, so far the Fund has managed to plant 29,400 trees on 62.3 acres of the deforested areas.
The theme of the tree planting is “Restoring the Green Canopy” with a call to other like-minded institutions to partner with the Foundation in restoring the Kakamega Forest canopy.
By George Kaiga
