County Government arrangements are in the nascent stages of formation in Kenya but EAWLS, with generous financial support, is at the forefront of efforts to monitor conservation needs in four of the counties to build networks that will help them manage natural resources prudently.

These networks will be crucial in formulation of county laws and policies that are people-driven and which promote natural resource management at county level and guarantee generation of revenue for county development and its sharing in an equitable and transparent manner

The project received  the financial support of the Government of Sweden/DFID under Act!’s (formerly PaKenya) Natural Resources (Changieni Rasili Mali) Facility for Non State Actors.

From January 2012 the project aims to strengthen Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and private sector county government legislative engagement process through formation of “County CSOs/Private Sector Natural Resources Management Networks”.

The project is being piloted in four counties namely Laikipia, Samburu, Nakuru and Kwale. The approach of this project is therefore to work within these counties and engage natural resource management stakeholders to form active natural resource management networks/forums, learn from them, and replicate and scale up activities in the other counties. Success from this model would provide a good opportunity for other counties stakeholders to form demand driven networks.

We will update you on this project in future newsletters.

By Michael Gachanja, EAWLS Deputy Director