Filip-C-Agoo-Everland-Marketing-Kenya-8772-WEB-low-resolution

Filip-C-Agoo-Everland-Marketing-Kenya-10641-WEB-low-resolution

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Kasigau Corridor

13,900,000+ tons of CO2 emissions avoided to date
1,700,000+ tons of CO2 avoided per year

Location: Kenya
Project Proponent(s): Wildlife Works
Standards: VCS, CCB

Project Summary
Intervention Model
Impact Highlights
Resources

Project Summary

The Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project, a pioneer in wildlife conservation, protects over 200,000 hectares of dryland forest with over 11,000 wild elephants that live in this ecosystem (2000+ of those elephants call Rukinga their permanent home). The project provides social programs that impact over 116,000 local people and provides the local community of the Kasigau Corridor region with long-term jobs that replace unsustainable sources of income such as poaching, subsistence agriculture and illegal tree harvesting. In an area where wildlife and human survival were at odds, the project has created a market-driven solution to wildlife conservation through an expansive community-led, community-based conservation model, with profound and lasting impact.

Intervention Model

The Threat

Community and wildlife were at odds when Wildlife Works first encountered Rukinga over 20 years ago. For many years, the land between Tsavo East and Tsavo West National Parks served as both the main migration corridor for local wildlife and a home to a slowly failing cattle ranch. Rukinga had become a bruised, balding and barren land with fields grazed to dust, poachers easily accessing the ranch and trees vanishing along a critical rainwater basin.

The Solution

Wildlife Works engaged the community and made the case in 1998 for establishing the Rukinga Wildlife Sanctuary, covering 80,000 acres of forest. A community works project was established providing the local community with an alternative income stream to replace the need to poach wildlife and clear the forests. Locally hired rangers were hired and trained to be guardians of the wilderness and cattle owners agreed to remove the cattle to reduce conflict over resources on the land.

The foundation of the project is job creation: Through carbon sales, Wildlife Works provides the local community of the Kasigau Corridor region in Southeast Kenya with long-term jobs that replace unsustainable sources of income such as poaching, subsistence agriculture and illegal tree harvesting, including:

Jobs supporting education

Jobs making eco-friendly products

Jobs protecting wildlife

Jobs managing the project

Jobs helping farmers

Jobs growing trees

Progress

The area protected has now expanded to over 200,00 hectares, which will offset 1.7 million tons of CO2 emissions per year over the next 30 years. The Kasigau Corridor REDD+ project, with the dryland Acacia-Commiphora forest under its protection and its original biodiversity restored, received Gold level status by the Community and Biodiversity Standard for exceptional biodiversity and climate benefits. The project area is home to an incredibly diverse population of wildlife including more than 20 species of bats, over 50 species of large mammals, over 300 species of birds and important populations of IUCN Red List species, including over 2,000 African Elephants, African Wild Dog, Cheetah, and Grevy’s Zebra.

With a long track record of steady, high-impact work, the project is beginning to see indicators of a transition towards a durable, long-term impact for the community, forest, and wildlife.