Understanding the connections between humans and nature is of key importance for natural resource management. In particular, pastoralist communities have received little attention.
We assessed the effects of ethnicity and location toward forest valuation in three forest islands in northern Kenya, inhabited by different pastoralist ethnic groups. Twelve focus groups with village elders were organised in each forest (n=36), to evaluate the ecosystem services provided by the forest (including wildlife), and assess which plant species are most important for provisioning different ecosystem services.
While water was always identified as the most important ecosystem service, the second most important differed; and some were only mentioned by one ethnic group or in one location (e.g. place for hiding during conflict, the role of wildlife). Preferred plant species for food, fodder, medicine resources, poles and firewood followed the same pattern, with important differences between ethnic groups and mountain.
Our results showed that ethnicity and location affect ecosystem services’ identification and importance ranking, even within pastoralist communities. This should be taken into account by decision-makers, e.g. as restricted access and regulated extraction is likely to affect people differently. Conservation and development projects would be more effective if they were initiated with an understanding of how people already use and value their forests.
Topics: Cognitive Research (Values, Attitudes, Behaviors) , Topics: Wildlife in an Ecosystem Services Paradigm
