PLA Notes CD-ROM 1988-2001 1 Participatory environmental valuation of forest resources in the Aberdares, Kenya

Document begins: PLA Notes CD-ROM 1988­2001 1 Participatory environmental valuation of forest resources in the Aberdares, Kenya Lucy Emerton and Hezron Mogaka Introduction perceptions, needs and priorities rather than according to our categories. Most of the closed canopy indigenous forests in Kenya are gazetted as Forest Reserves and Most forest uses are illegal. People are reluctant managed by the government Forest Department to speak openly about their forest activities under a system of strict protection. But because they fear arrest. Some activities also protection has been an inequitable and have ritual or cultural significance, and knowledge is considered the preserve of ineffective means of forest conservation. It has specialist groups. Households are reticent in the prohibited access to vital forest resources and face of direct questioning. However, using generated little local support. Forest planners and managers have bypassed local communities pictures of different forest activities (collecting and their constraints and priorities in the fuelwood and building materials, gathering conservation process. medicines and wild foods, grazing livestock, making hives) helps to stimulate discussion (see Figure 1). The Forest Department are attempting to move away from `traditional' protection measures - We use these pictures to value forest use. Cash preventing human access ...