Kenyan community hopes renewable energy can keep them and their crops safe from marauding animals
NAIROBI (AlertNet) - For many Kenyan farmers, the onset of summer triggers fears of drought and failed harvests. But for one community living on the northeast flank of Mount Kenya, the sun’s glow could hold the answer to an age-old problem.
A 20-km stretch of solar-powered electric fencing is being erected in Kithigina village, which Julia Nkirote hopes will enable her to work her two-acre farm in peace, safe from the marauding elephants that wander out of the neighbouring forest.
Nkirote estimates the fencing will save the community losses from elephant raids on the scale of thousands of shillings or around $250 each month, as well as protecting her kin from potentially lethal elephant charges.
“A stray elephant can, in just one night, clear the entire crop on a one-acre piece of land,” says the mother of four. “We usually expect them at least twice a week. I hope the solar fence is the solution we have been waiting for.”
As in other indigenous communities in Africa, renewable energy technologies are fast becoming the method of choice for keeping wildlife off farms, says Nicholas Kunga, a natural resources management consultant.
These methods tap into easily accessible and clean sources of energy, helping limit emissions of the harmful greenhouse gases that are heating up the planet and causing climate change.
Kenya has joined a list of African countries where communities are adopting solar fencing, including South Africa, Botswana, Namibia, Uganda and Tanzania, according to Kunga, who also consults on climate change issues.
In many cases, he says, people are forced to look for creative ways of solving their battles with wildlife following years of neglect by governments.
MILD SHOCK
During the 53 years Nkirote has lived in Kithigina village, she has participated in attempts to lobby the government for assistance to keep the elephants out of the farms, but to little avail.
The only help offered by the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) was the sinking of a trench in 1978, recalls Nkirote, but this didn’t work because torrential rains filled it with silt, allowing the elephants to cross.
A response to the villagers’ appeals finally came late last year through the Constituency Development Fund (CDF), a government-led initiative to support communities established in 2003 by the CDF Act.
Dry wood poles have already been sunk on the 20-km stretch of land earmarked for fencing, and three electric wires will be attached to these.
Using simple solar technology to tap the energy generated by the sun, CDF area manager Samson Githinji explains the wires will allow a current of 85 watts to flow through the fence.
KWS - which the community says is now more receptive to their concerns - says the voltage generated by the solar fence will give stray elephants a mild shock, enough to keep them away from the farms.
LIVING IN HARMONY?
According to KWS officer Jonathan Kirui, the solar fence has been tested elsewhere in Central Kenya, where it was found to reduce conflict between game and local communities.
A 15-km solar fence erected five years ago in Ruiri village in Meru County, an agricultural region some 300 km southeast of Nairobi, has so far protected farms from destructive elephant raids.
Initially supported by the European Union, the fencing project has brought hope to a community ravaged by years of confrontation with the beasts.
“The problem is escalated by the fact that some of these communities live on the elephants’ migratory corridor, while parts of the Mt. Kenya forest have been identified as breeding territories,” says Kirui.
62-year-old Zackary Mwiti from Ruiri recalls the days when children would not even attend school for fear of coming face to face with wandering elephants, while parents would watch helplessly as seasons passed without a harvest to their name.
ANGRY BEASTS
Until the EU-led initiative came to Mwiti’s village, herds were scared away through a low-tech performance of whistles, torchlight and drumming on metal sheets. But sometimes things would get ugly.
“One day we were deep in the forest, chasing away a lone elephant when all of a sudden it turned its wrath on us,” remembers Mwiti. “Now, when that happens, you must run away as fast as possible.”
Mwiti and his colleagues were lucky to escape unscathed, unlike M’Ibeere, a villager who often sneaked into the forest to collect foliage for his livestock. Ibeere was heading back from one of his occasional foraging trips when his moving bushy figure on the track drew the curiosity of a stray elephant.
Irritated by the intrusion, the animal charged. A dig from its lethal tusks into the vegetation Ibeere was carrying, combined with an upward thrust, catapulted Ibeere into the canopy of 100 m-tall trees, minus the feed and a few ribs.
“There used to be more human-wildlife conflict before the government imposed a ban on any unauthorised activity in the forest,” says Joseph Githinji Gakere, who looks after another section of the Mt. Kenya forest. “Controlling the elephants, however, is still a nightmare for us because we only have crude weapons to use.”
David Njagi is an environmental writer based in Nairobi.
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