Kenyans Fear Dakatcha Woodlands Biofuel Expansion

Kenyans fear Dakatcha Woodlands biofuel growth

23 March 2011

By Will Ross

BBC News, Dakatcha

Being in the shade of a tree beside his hut in in Kenya’s Dakatcha Woodlands, Joshua Kahindi Pekeshe is bold.

“We are not going to let this land go even if it means shedding blood,” he informed the BBC.

“Land is extremely important to us. We farm and get our livelihood from it. On this land we bury our dead.”

He is one of the lots of people opposed to the creation of a large biofuel plantation in the area, about an hour’s drive inland from the seaside town of Malindi.

It is a dry location and home to some 20,000 people along with globally threatened animal and bird types.

Ambitious objectives

An Italian business has asked the authorities for approval to rent 50,000 hectares there to grow jatropha, whose seeds are abundant in oil that can be developed into bio-diesel.

This plant, initially from South America, has long been grown in Africa as a hedge to stay out animals – goats stay well away as it is poisonous. The area impacted is community land which is being held in trust by the regional council.

Kenya Jatropha Energy Ltd is 100%-owned by the Milan-based Nuove Iniziative Industriali SRL.

It has rented nearly a million hectares in Africa; jatropha oil from a plantation in Senegal is being supplied to the Swedish furnishings retailer Ikea. Other companies have leased land for the exact same function in Ethiopia, Mozambique and Ghana, in addition to in India.

This expansion has been stimulated by the European Union, which has actually set enthusiastic objectives for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and lowering its reliance on imported oil.

The 27 EU countries have actually signed up to an instruction which mentions that by 2020, 20% of energy ought to be from sustainable sources, external.

Why is Africa impacted?

Because it is difficult to discover 50,000 hectares of readily available land to grow a biofuel crop in, for example, the UK or Italy.

Why ‘feed’ a car?

But campaign groups have actually labelled some of the tasks in Africa “land grabs” with dire consequences for the often voiceless African communities.

Some ask: “Why ‘feed’ a vehicle in Europe when hunger in the house is still a reality?”

“Our future is no longer in our hands. We have been told we need to move because they want to plant jatropha here,” stated 27-year-old Merciline Koi, a mom of 2, who included that there had been no offer of compensation for leaving her home in Dakatcha Woodlands.

Kenya Jetropha Energy Ltd says the negotiations are over – the government has okayed for a pilot task to begin with 10,000 hectares and all it is waiting on now is the final documentation.

The business says numerous permanent and thousands of seasonal jobs will be developed and it rejects that anyone will be displaced by the job.

“We wish to secure the houses and the private home. We will farm around your houses,” Kenya Jatropha Energy Ltd head Girardello Adriano told the BBC from Milan.

“We are helping these people. They are extremely happy for this job. No-one will be moved.”

How green are biofuels?

According to the Kenyan government’s environment guard dog, the offer has not yet been sealed. It denied the preliminary 50,000-hectare request pointing out issues over the influence on the environment and the sustainability of the job.

“We were recommending 1,000 hectares … We have actually informed them to validate if the number needs to alter and that is why we have not approved the job up to now,” stated Benjamin Malwa Langwen, of the National Environment Management Authority (Nema).

However, there are now fresh require the Dakatcha task to be scrapped as new research calls into question whether jatropha is truly a greener alternative to oil.

The anti-poverty campaign group ActionAid and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) commissioned a report to examine simply how green the jatropha project in Kenya’s Dakatcha woodlands would be.

The study by the consultancy group North Energy, external found that jatropha would give off in between 2.5 and 6 times more greenhouse gases when compared to nonrenewable fuel sources.

This is partially due to the fact that large quantities of carbon are saved in the forests’ plants and soil however the plantation would mean clearing the land of this plant life.

“The report reveals that EU policies are foolish policies because they are not reducing greenhouse gas emissions as the EU is announcing,” said ActionAid’s Chris Coxon.

“The proposed biofuel plantation will ravage the forests, driving the globally threatened Clarke’s Weaver bird to termination and denying countless regional people of their livelihoods,” said Helen Byron of the RSPB.

In action, the EU Commission protected its energy policy as “the most comprehensive and innovative sustainability scheme for biofuels throughout the world”.

Unorthodox methods

At the remote Mulunguni primary school, which lies within the Dakatcha Woodlands, several new class and pit latrines have actually simply been developed.

They were part funded by the European Union – the very organisation which is now accused of pressing policies which residents fear could see the school shut down.

“My concern is the displacement of the community. It is bad to construct a classroom and then send out the students away,” said the deputy head Godfrey Karissa.

“Yes we require jobs. But a farm without a home is not good. You require to have a home before you go to your task.”

There are plainly issues on the ground that when the lease is signed, the population will be at the mercy of a profit-driven business.

Ikea says it will not source jatropha oil from Kenya until it can be sure that this will not add to the conversion of natural habitats.

“This switch from nonrenewable fuel sources to renewable energy need to never be at the expenditure of people or the environment,” Ikea informed the BBC in a statement.

The forests are also an abundant source of material for standard medicine.

If they feel let down by the federal government and the regional authorities, locals just may turn to unorthodox methods in a bid to keep the land.

“If all the seniors come together for one goal, then it is really simple to eliminate him with our medicines,” stated Barova Kiribai, a conventional healer, describing the owner of the Italian biofuels business.

The fate of the individuals here remains in the hands of the Kenyan government and Malindi’s municipal council.

It is not unexpected they are fretted.

Kenya’s political leaders do not have a good performance history when it concerns working in the interests of individuals.

ActionAid

Kenya Jatropha Energy

RSPB

Nema

Ikea