200,000 hectares, 750,000 people: Kenya's $200 million plan to heal its watersheds

In Nairobi on 2 November, Environment Cabinet Secretary Dr Deborah Barasa launched the Kenya Watershed Services Improvement Project — a five-year, $200 million, World Bank-financed programme to restore 200,000 hectares of degraded land across 12 counties. The work targets five landscapes — Marsabit, Marmanet, the Nyambene Hills, the Chyulu Hills and the Shimba Hills — where forests and watersheds decide whether taps, farms and wells survive the dry season. About 750,000 people are expected to benefit, with particular attention to community groups, nature-based enterprises and vulnerable communities. It is restoration at the scale of the problem: Kenya estimates 88.6% of its land is at risk of degradation, and natural resources support more than 80% of livelihoods.

SDG 15 · Life on land — Mechanism: institutional program