Boré - Latest project monitoring visit

We've just completed our latest monitoring visit to the Boré tropical afforestation project and overall everything in the field is looking good. It has been raining heavily in this part of Africa for the last 6 months or more which is giving our most recently planted trees a really good start.  Distribution of the latest batch of seedlings is underway currently as more seasonal rains are expected any day now.  We have also started preparing for the next distribution tranche which is creating a large amount of work for local women. Filling hundreds of thousands of 'polypots' with soil is a big task so our normal nursery workforce of 60, swells at this time to 125 women - see below:

This work not only results in the planting of loads of fast growing, carbon-hungry trees but it also protects the crucially important carbon reserves that are retained by the local tropical forest because it means these women don't have to go out into the nearby woods and cut down trees to make charcoal - which is there only other sure-fire way of making an income. Since we started working with this community in 2007/8, charcoal burning has very much reduced and we are determined to keep it that way. However on these monitoring visits we do still often notice charcoal being hauled out of the adjacent forest areas. This activity is illegal in Kenya but the poor farmers who continue to do it, often have no alternative ways to put food on the table.... Most charcoal leaves the forest on motorbikes that can negotiate the rough roads and tracks that penetrate deep into the bush and we've found that because of this illegality, the charcoal carriers do not appreciate having their pictures taken. Our way to avoid any confrontation is to sneak up on them from the rear and then drive away before they realise! 

This guy is bringing out topical forest carbon in the form of charcoal and he will then fill up the plastic jerry cans with petrol to fuel his next extractive trip into the interior bush so there is little to applaud in this image... #sadface.... but its not all bad news like this. There still remain significant residual stands of original Coastal Forest in the area around Boré and in the near future we are aiming to propagate and plant more indigenous species such as Brachystegia spiciformis which will enable Tree-Nation members to directly afforest the region with the varieties that the original forest comprises of , like these trees below....

Our 4-strong team of motorbike-riding planting site monitors are doing a great job of checking on the trees we plant and whilst they wend their way through the difficult forested terrain they also keep an eye out for any charcoal burning that might be going on. If they find any (its often betrayed by the smell of the smoke), then they report it and we make sure we put a stop to it. Below Lakheri Kivure one of the monitoring team (and our project photographer) sets off on her daily round of planting site visits. 

Go Lakheri! Monitor those sites and stop that charcoal burning please!!! (For all our sakes)