Green Economies

Carbon Green Africa

Carbon Green Africa is a company in Zimbabwe that runs the Kariba REDD+ forest conservation project in the Zambezi Valley, on the south shore of Lake Kariba. CGA employs people but its biggest contribution is creating opportunities –new ways for people to earn a living, and ways to improve what they currently do.

Addressing climate change is central to the project. One cause of climate change is the large amount of carbon dioxide that human beings release into the atmosphere. Plants absorb carbon dioxide when they grow and store it as biomass: stems, branches, roots and leaves. Trees and grass contain a lot of carbon. Organic matter in the soil contains a lot of carbon. When this plant biomass is burned the carbon is released back into the atmosphere. You can read more about climate change in the PACE Energy & Climate change module.

Climate Change is a global problem, it effects all parts of the planet. Because of this people and companies around the world invest money to reduce carbon emissions. The money they invest is called carbon credits or carbon offsets. It goes to projects like Kariba REDD+ in Zimbabwe to help local councils, communities and education authorities to reduce carbon emissions. They help communities to farm and live in ways that are productive and profitable but do not contribute to climate change. They organise training that helps people earn a good living without harming the environment.

“I was one of the deforestation culprits before I met Carbon Green Africa because I was cutting down trees to make bee hives using tree bark. Kariba REDD+ project has changed my life. I used to make traditional hives. CGA then introduced Kenyan Top Bar Beehives. We were taught how to make them. I benefited with three hives that are giving me a good yield as compared to the traditional hives. I am now conserving the trees surrounding my area. With traditional hives, I used to harvest a small amount of honey just for my family but with Kenyan Top Bar Hives, I am getting enough for both market and family. I sell the honey in my neighbourhood and surrounding towns like Karoi, Magunje, and Makuti. With Kenyan top bar hives, I can achieve my dream goals ie sending my children to universities.”

Rogers Chingwena, A beekeeper from ward 8 in Hurungwe

Green Economies

Some beekeepers earn a lot of money from renting their hives to other farmers. Bees keep elephants away so protect their crops from elephant damage!

“Kariba REDD+ project was introduced in my village Chundu in 2011. Since then, I was trained in different workshops to broaden my knowledge on conservation farming. My lifestyle totally changed because I used to work on huge plots with few inputs and the outputs were poor. With the knowledge from CGA, I reduced my acreage to a 25m x 50m plot. This season I used dead mulch at one side of the plot and live mulch at the other side. I harvested two scotch carts of pumpkins from my live mulch hence I killed two birds with one stone i.e. I benefitted both maize and pumpkins. I am using these pumpkins to feed both my family and my domestic animals. I will never go back to traditional farming method again because I was straining myself working on large plot producing poor results. Thank you CGA for introducing Kariba REDD+ project.”

Tree nurseries producing tree seedlings are an important source of plants for re-afforestation and also a valuable source of income.

Carbon Green Africa creates opportunities for people in work as diverse as beekeeping, firefighting, developing nutritional gardens, conservation agriculture and environmental protection. Trainers and facilitators work with the project. Trainers teach adults from different backgrounds and with different educational and skill levels.

The project has created opportunities for foresters, agronomists, vets, borehole experts, drivers, teachers, nurses and many more. Setting up and running a project like CGA involves people who specialise in governance, law, accounting, experts in monitoring and evaluation, research, international relations, project management, sociology and research.

Action sheet 49. TREE PLANTING

Action sheet 56. WHERE TO GET TREE SEEDS

Green Economies

BeadWORKS, Kenya

Beading is a traditional skill that women in Kenya use to make personal jewellery and other traditional decorative items.

BeadWORKS is a social enterprise that was set up by The Northern RangeLands Trust in 2007. It organizes women’s groups and helps them sell their beaded products. Initially it was a donorfunded project. Zoos Victoria in Australia gave extra help that grew the program to over 600 beaders.

In 2014 BeadWORKS became part of NRT Trading and started using a Star Beader production system. This is a way of working together that gives responsibility to the women themselves. They do quality control - every item is checked for quality by someone in each group. If the standard is poor it is not sent to the BeadWORKS office. The women quickly learn what is good enough to be sold, and they work to high standards. They also work together to create new designs, and new products that are attractive to a wide range of customers in Kenya and in other countries. The Star beader system has helped them learn new techniques and styles and has provided them with credit and savings programmes. In 2019 1300 women were part of Beadworks, with sales worth $250,000 a year.

Conservancies are organisations that manage community lands sustainably - in ways that help both people and wildlife to thrive.

The Northern Rangelands Trust works for 39 community conservancies in a large part of northern Kenya. It helps with management, training and other services.

The NRT Trading is what’s called an Incubator of Sustainable Social Enterprises –it helps individual or groups of people to set up social enterprises and gives advice on running them.

Green Economies

Women are empowered, families, wildlife and the environment thriving.

In this area of Kenya, in the past, women were marginalised, often illiterate and restricted to domestic activity. A regular income from beading work and access to the outside world has empowered the women. Beadworks has given women confidence and respect, so that now they are now included in society. When the women come together they talk about more than beading, they have learned about health and hygiene, about savings, about business. They have learned about ways to run a household, about the conservancies and the NRT. They now speak for themselves, do things for themselves and have savings. They can think for the future and plan for their children, they have information and means to make informed choices.

With a regular income the women have been able to improve nutrition, pay health and doctors bills, pay for clean water and sanitation by purchasing water storage tanks, solar panels to power lights and technology. Many women purchase improved cookstoves, some buy gas or ethanol stoves. This means they use less or don’t have to collect firewood. Some purchase water tanks so they can store water, saving the many hours they had to spend carrying water. They have learned about family planning - that smaller families mean better standards of living and less pressure on natural resources. The women are improving their own and their families lives without resorting to activities that damage the environment, like charcoal production or overgrazing grasslands with sheep and goats. Because Beadworks is a Social Enterprise, 5% of income is given to the conservancies as conservation fees. They have given $27,000 to their Conservancies. As contributors they attend board meetings and are involved in decision making. They contribute wisely to running the conservancies - prioritising education, health, women and girl’s health and well-being and family. They have earned respect and recognition.

Glossary

Bed Fee

Board

Carbon (C)

See Conservation fees.

Group of people appointed to manage or administer a company or organisation.

Carbon is a chemical element. It’s atomic number is 6. It is very abundant and exists in different forms. It joins with other elements to form compounds. All living things contain a lot of carbon, as compounds with elements like oxygen and hydrogen. Read about the carbon cycle in the energy module, it is one of earths most important natural cycles. Carbon compounds contain a lot of energy. Carbon dioxide CO2 is a ‘greenhouse gas’.

Carbon footprint

Clean Energy

Climate Change

Similar to ecological and environmental footprint but measures only the greenhouse gas component. It is the amount of carbon emitted into the atmosphere as a result of our activities. It is expressed as tonnes of carbon dioxide.

Energy that is produced without release of green house gases. Renewable energy is clean.

Climate change, also called Global Warming is the long-term change in weather patterns caused by a gradual heating of the earth’s surface, oceans and atmosphere. The Climate change that we are experiencing now is a result of what we call the greenhouse effect. It is caused by an increase in certain gases in the atmosphere, they absorb the suns energy and trap it in the atmosphere just as heat is trapped in a greenhouse. PACE ENERGY & CLIMATE CHANGE MODULE.

Collaborate

Community conservancy

Conservancy

Conservation Fees

To work together.

A community-based organisation created to support the management of community owned land for the benefit of the livelihoods of community members. They are legally registered, governed by a locally elected board of directors and run by a local management team.

An organisation that manages community lands sustainably, in ways that help both people and wildlife to thrive.

Contributions that businesses or visitors make to support the costs of conservation and community development in conservation sites. Community enterprises linked to the NRT in Kenya (page 30) contribute a proportion of their profit to local community conservancies – it is used for running costs, to sponsor needy children in school, for microfinance, infrastructure like clean water; to promote peace and security and other community needs. Tourists sometimes pay conservation fees, it may be a ‘Bed fee’ added to hotel bills, or a proportion of their profit paid by tourism businesses.

Cooperative

Ecological footprint or Environmental Footprint

Working together; working together for common benefit. A business or group that is usually created by, and run and owned by its members, for their common benefit.

A measure of the impact we have on the environment. It can be calculated for an individual, or any group whether a household, school, community, organisation, country, etc. Estimated by calculating the area of land and water needed to provide everything we use and consume to provide all our needs and to absorb the waste produced by all of these. It takes into account all the activities and all the resources we use, directly and indirectly – for our food, shelter, transportation, goods and services. If we produce food locally using conservation farming, then our footprint will be less than if we use artificial fertilisers, and less than if we buy imported food because energy and resources are used to process, package and transport. It is expressed as an area. There are equations to calculate our ecological footprint www.footprintnetwork.org

Glossary

Empowered

Environmental Justice

Given the power to achieve; given opportunity, freedom, confidence to realise something particular or potential, including over life decisions.

Is about environmental security, human rights and social need. Ensuring everybody is involved in decisions about natural resources and processes, and policies to do with managing, protecting and use of natural resources are fair and for the benefit all groups in society.

Ethanol Stoves

Family Planning

Ethanol is a biofuel, made by fermenting sugarcane, maize or other starch. It is sold as a liquid in refillable bottles, an alternative to kerosene, wood or charcoal. The stoves look like a gas stove, burn with a flame and are a clean, convenient and affordable way to cook. Ethanol can also be used to fuel heaters.

Regulating the number and spacing of children, deciding on the method and accessing contraception to do this. Family planning includes learning about health, social, economic and wider benefits of spacing births and limiting childbearing. It is for men, women, young, adult, married and unmarried people.

Green Economy

A green economy is one that improves human well-being and builds social equity while reducing environmental risks and scarcities. It reduces waste, damage to the environment and to human health. Social equity is opportunity and fair access to resources.

Green Jobs

Hygiene

Jobs that support a green economy.

Concerns cleanliness - keeping ourselves and the environment around us clean, in a way that promotes health and prevents disease. Personal hygiene includes washing hands, cleaning teeth and bathing regularly.

Improved Cookstoves

Fuel-efficient stoves for cooking with fire that make homes safer and protect the environment. They use up to two thirds less fuel than traditional stoves, cook food more quickly, more safely, with less smoke, prevent deforestation and free up time taken to collect wood. Can be made using mud, clay, metal, concrete or a combination of these.

Low Carbon Livelihoods

Marginalised

Natural Resources

Northern Rangelands Trust (NRT)

A way of life that results in minimum release of carbon into the atmosphere. A lifestyle that has a low carbon footprint.

Left out. Not included. Without opportunity. On the edge or outside.

Anything that comes from nature or the natural environment: air, water, minerals, plants, animals, sources of energy. Natural resources can be divided into renewable and nonrenewable. Renewable natural resources can be replenished, more can be grown or they are part of a continuous cycle (like water). Non-renewable resources like oil and other minerals are finite.

An organisation of 39 community conservancies in Kenya. Key wildlife species live in NRT community conservancies, including elephant, lion, giraffe, oryx, hirola, black rhino. They are home to 320,000 people from 18 ethnic groups. The conservancies include dense forests, mountains, big rivers, deserts, savannahs, lakes, deltas and the Indian Ocean.. NRT helps communities organise themselves, to run peace and security programmes, manage natural resources and sustainable businesses linked to conservation.

Glossary

Nutrients are nourishing substances. The different groups of nutrients that our bodies need to stay healthy are - protein, carbohydrate, fat, fibre, vitamins, minerals, and water. We get nutrients from food and drink.

Nutrition refers to the food and drink we consume and how they influence our health. Good nutrition is a balanced diet that provides all the nutrients we need, in the correct quantities. Nutrition also refers to the study of nutrients and the nutritional value of food, how our body processes food and nutrients and the effect it has on our health.

Concerns supply of clean water and disposal or drainage of dirty water and sewage. a business with a social and/or environmental purpose as well as a goal to make profit. A social enterprise is a business that earns income from trading and reinvests profit either to build the business or to support the social or environmental goals.

A business with a social and/or environmental purpose as well as a goal to make profit. A social enterprise is a business that earns income from trading and reinvests profit either to build the business or to support the social or environmental goals.

Social

Differs from legal justice, it is about fairness in society, about money, opportunity, basic needs, being available to everybody equally and about fair and just relationships between different groups in society.

A production system used by bead workers in the NRT (page 30). It makes their business more efficient, profitable and empowering to members. Groups select members with leadership and entrepreneurial skills as Star Beaders. They oversee production and ensure deadlines are met, that only high-quality work is sent to customers.

Can keep surviving and thriving into the future without damaging the environment or using up resources. Can be maintained at the same level in the long term and be resilient to threats. The sustainability of something is the extent to which it is sustainable.

References & Credits

Africa our Home. Sasha Norris with Nancy Gladstone. 2017. Published by Siren Conservation and TUSK Trust.

Cameroon our Home. 2014. Published by TAMA Books, BP 307, Yaounde.

Chambers dictionary. 2003. Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd. Edinburgh.

PACE Educators’ Booklet. Glossary of Environmental Terms. 2018. www.paceproject.net.

www.unenvironment.org/explore-topics accessed November 2019.

Photo credits

Julia Gunther, page 1

Erim Moroney, page 2

Penelope Fraser, PACE, pages 4, 5, 6 & 7

Big Life Foundation, page 8

Jeremy Goss, BLF, page 9 top

Richard Bonham, page 9 lower

Donald Mbohli pages 10,11 & 22

James Suter, page 12

Safeena Chaudhry, page 13

Cathy Dreyer, page 15

TUSK, pages 17, 19, 20 & 23

Robin, NRT, page 28

Rochelle Hansen, page 29

Conservation through Public Health, page 18

Northern Rangelands Trust, page 21

Carbon Green Africa, pages 26 & 27