Community Resilience Building

Sustainable Livelihoods

Gender Equality

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Climate Action

problem & solution

Tana River county faces three main disasters: drought, floods and resulting conflicts over resources. The county's poverty index stands at a high of 66.7%. Gender inequalities, including sexual and gender-based violence and harmful traditional practices are deeply rooted. Most of the land is communal and held under customary land systems; traditional male elders hold authority over who gets to use land, which often means that women are left out. These inequalities are exacerbated by climate change and ecosystem degradation, often manifesting in family tensions and domestic violence.

The solution was to apply a multifaceted, interconnected, and community-led approach (REBUILD project), which integrates issues related to gender as well as climate change.

the experience

GROOTS Kenya has actively involved communities in identifying their own needs, designing and implementing practical solutions. Gender is not viewed as a stand-alone issue, rather it is interlaced into environment and climate change topics for wholistic interventions. The REBUILD project multi-layered design incorporates traditional and local knowledge in delivering interventions such as:

Resilience building and training on climate-resilient agricultural practices, land reclamation, diversification of livelihoods and group revolving funds.
Transforming gender norms and empowering women to advocate for their needs, access productive assets, take up agribusinesses etc. Women are trained and engaged as champions to lead such initiatives.
Addressing GBV by involving men in awareness programmes, creating safe shelters and psychosocial support and assistance to survivors

Stakeholder, institutions and groups mainly involved in the implementation:

Project consortium partners: CISP (Consortium lead) implemented in tana River and Tana delta sub counties
Groots Kenya- gender lead and implementer at Tana river Sub county
Nature Kenya- Nature based solutions and implemented at Tana Delta
PROCASUR Africa-learning and knowledge sharing
NDMA- National link and supervisor
Community Members and Champions-project participants and mentors
County Government and Officials (Agriculture, Livestock, and Fisheries)- facilitators and members of technical working group
Other Collaborators: East African Grain Council, Kenya Industrial Research and Development Institute- technical capacity and facilitators.
Funding Source: EU-evaluators and overall donors.

Challenges

In some cases, women faced cultural barriers to participating in the project. i.e., some women were not allowed to participate in beekeeping because of communal beliefs
Drought made agriculture and livestock rearing difficult

Impact

Increased access to land for women: 927 acres of land were reallocated to women
Trained women in agro-ecology and climate-smart agriculture, which increased agricultural productivity and helped women to gain new sources of income
Helped to expand the agency of women

Lessons Learned

Working closely with communities to identify their needs and priorities is key
Offering to women the skills and resources they need to make decisions about their own lives helps to expand their agency
It is important to constantly adapt to local conditions