ICUN to fund groups in five Wards in Makueni County to fight climate change

Makueni, Sunday, June 11, 2023

KNA by Patrick Nyakundi

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (ICUN) in partnership with National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) in Makueni County will develop restoration plans in five Wards to help fight climate change under Towards Ending Emergencies (TWENDE) Programme.

The ICUN Project Officer Joan Kebenei speaking in Makindu town on Saturday, said that the restoration action plans that emanates from the community, will be implemented to restore the degraded areas during the five-year plan.

She disclosed that Thange, Ivingoni/Nzambani, Makindu, Nguu/Masumba and Nguumo wards will benefit during the period under review.

"We will support communities with money to ensure the restoration action plans that will be linked to restoration enterprises are implemented," said Kebenei during a Technical Consultation meeting that brought together all relevant officers from the two levels of government and Non-governmental Organizations.

"In addition, we have identified two dry land value chains that the various groups will do namely fodder and honey during the period. The programme is being funded by the Green Climate Fund (GEF)," she disclosed.

Kebenei who is also a Landscape Coordinator said that they have been accredited by GEF while saying that the various groups that will benefit, will be given loans where they will repay the same amount without interest.

Consequently, she revealed that they will work with the existing groups under the Livestock Department that are already established and recognized by the government.

"We will engage a consultant who will come and ask the various groups the amount of money they need to complete the project. A local Micro-financial institution will be giving the loans that will be like a revolving fund at the community level. They will return the same money advanced to them at no interest. ,"she posed.

At the same time, Kebenei said they resorted to giving loans as opposed to grants because groups tend to misuse monies advanced to them as grants.

"When money is given to groups as a grant, the members usually decide to share the money among themselves as a result fail to utilize the funds in line with project objectives," she noted.

The programme is also being implemented in Taita Taveta, Kajiado, Meru, Tharaka Nithi, Marsabit, Kitui, Isiolo, Garissa and Tana River counties that expected to restore a total of 550,000 hectares of land.

However, Kebenei did not disclose the amount of money that will go towards restoration of the land in the 11 ASAL counties.

On her part, The Acting NDMA County Drought Coordinator (CDC) Alice Mwongeli Munyao said that they have had the input from the communities in the five Wards and they were filling the gaps besides fine tuning the action plans.

"We have technical officers who are fine tuning and filling the gaps and also inputting the budget," said Munyao.

The programme that was scheduled to run from 2020 to 2025 was delayed due to few hiccups which have since been resolved.

Courtesy ; K. N. A