The changing face of Tana Delta

In the golden light of late afternoon, the air sweeping across Kipini in the Tana Delta is satisfying.

 The farms around are dotted with patches of lush green, a phenomenon that is slowly replicating across 105 villages spread across the country's largest delta, the Tana Delta.

 “The delta is changing. The forests are becoming more intact, and communities are more protective of them. Farmers are planting crops that previously were not thought of as valuable,” says Abdallah Islam.

 Every year, areas that were initially mapped as degraded are becoming filled with more trees, and the farms that were initially bare are turning into patches of green, but with different crops.

 The Tana Delta is a designated wetland of international importance covering 130,000 hectares. It is situated in both Tana River and Lamu Counties and features a variety of habitats, including riverine forest, grassland, woodland, lakes, mangroves, dunes, beaches, estuaries, and coastal waters.

 Besides being critical to the communities, the Tana Delta is home to several species that are not found anywhere else, like the Tana River red colobus and Tana River crested Mangabey.

 The delta is also designated as an Important Bird Area, hosting over 340 species of birds, some of which are rare and threatened with extinction.

 When delta remains undisturbed, it acts like a sponge, absorbing floods, storing water, and slowly releasing it during the dry season. 

 However, despite being one of the richest ecosystems, the changing and extreme weather events created conflicts over resources. Coupled with a growing population and a lack of management plans in place, the conflicts intensified.

 “There was a lot of destruction within the delta a few years ago. Burning charcoal and logging were very rampant, but these activities have reduced because of the restoration initiatives that are actively involving the communities,” says Maurice Kadenge.

 To address advancing threats that were already causing challenges within the delta, a project was rolled out in June 2019. The Global Environment Facility (GEF), through the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), launched the Restoration Initiative (TRI) Tana Delta.

 The project, which is being implemented by Nature Kenya, is targeted at restoring degraded areas that have been mapped.

 The project was rolled out after researchers warned that one of the country’s rich coastal ecosystems was in danger.

  According to the statistics from a mapping that was done as part of the project, over 123,000 hectares of land within the delta were mapped as facing serious degradation. These areas included the range-lands, farming areas, wetlands, and forests.

 The degradation is partly attributed to extreme weather patterns that resulted in severe floods and droughts, leading to a scarcity of resources.

 Given delta’s rich and vast grasslands, the region often experiences a large influx of cattle during the dry seasons, exceeding the carrying capacity. This, according to the experts, is a major cause of degradation.

 The majority of the residents in the Tana Delta are either farmers or pastoralists. However, during the dry season, there is a huge influx of livestock from as far as Mandera, which are brought to seek refuge in the delta.

 "Often, this results in conflicts with farmers, who are also struggling to make ends meet,” says ** Nyara, the chair of Lower Tana Delta Conservancy.

 As per the statistics, 64,802 hectares of grazing zones were mapped to be highly degraded, while over 53,000 hectares of both cropland and wetlands were also mapped. 6,400 hectares of forest land were degraded. 

 According to Paul Matiku, the director of Nature Kenya, considering the potential of the delta as both a productive agricultural area and a tourism destination, given its status as a biodiversity hotspot, there is a need to develop policies and plans to manage the use of resources within the fragile delta.

 “The research revealed that the conflicts were increasing as a result of diminishing resources, yet the delta has a very high potential in tourism, fishing, agriculture, and conservation," he says.

 "This is a place where you get both terrestrial and riverine forests, intertidal zones, marine forests, grasslands, and open beaches. These habitats provide a home to many species of wildlife.”

 The restoration initiative was building on previous projects' achievements, like the implementation of the Tana Delta land use plan, a project by the Darwin Initiative.

 Under the restoration initiative, the restoration starts from the village level, where 55 village resource and land use committees make decisions.

 “Under this project, the communities are fully engaged. We used the existing science to guide the processes, for example, in restoring degraded areas, besides supporting them to raise seedlings, the communities also came up with their seed banks where they collect the seeds from local trees during the dry season and do a mass planting during the rainy seasons,” he said.

 During the period, over 11,000 hectares were restored from the initial target of 10,000 hectares of highly degraded areas. Forest management plans for four forests covering over 101,971 hectares have also been developed.

 Besides actively planting trees and grass in these areas, a green investment plan was developed where farmers could benefit from the resources while engaging in restoration.

 The project, known as Tana Delta Green Heart, promotes farmers to produce, process, and market their products from the Tana River Delta in a move to improve livelihoods and promote biodiversity conservation.

 "The Tana River Green Heart Initiative is an approach that brings investors on board private sector for development. This model has an industrial park," says Forest and Landscape Restoration Programme manager Rudolf Makhanu

 "Within the industrial parks are processing industries that create a market and demand for the produce from the farmers who are engaging in productive ventures."

 Currently, eleven cooperatives have been established where farmers supply crops such as cowpeas, green grams, rice, sesame seeds, sunflower, beekeeping, chilli, fish, and meat.

 Milka Musyoki, the project field manager says although rice farmers in the region have been experiencing challenges of saltwater intrusion, the supply of rice varieties that tolerate salt and floods has boosted the production in rice-producing areas.

 “With the changing environment, farmers needed to adapt to new crops and even seed varieties that are adapted to these changes. Chilli farming, for example, is a new venture in drier areas, just like sesame farming. Introduction of new rice seeds has also boosted the production in the delta,” she says.

 “Our greatest challenge was accessing the seeds that could thrive under the changing environment, but through partnerships and training, we can now access the seeds that can do well in floods and even in salty water,” says Mohammed Mashaka, a rice farmer.

 Kennedy Olwasi, the deputy director of the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry, says the initiatives in the delta have demonstrated how implementation of  land management plans can reverse the trends.

 "We see a lot of positives in sustainable land management practices because of the trainings and engagements that have been going on within the Delta