Panorama archive · Environment
Community Initiatives Engaging in Saving Kenya's Heritage
Originally published

"Youth groups and education institutions are doing a lot on the ground" says Yvonne Maingi, Tunza youth Advisor. She has major
Focus on capacity to enable these parties to understand on how to build capacity. This is a very important aspect that lacks in nearly all initiatives and activists that are fighting for something.
As a student at the University of nairobi who regularly interacts with students running startups and organisations. I find this information very true. There are a lot of amazing concerns being raised by my friends and colleges. I find two out that two organisations stood out, one called 'Friends of Maasai Mara' and the other 'Friends of Turkana'. I chose to study these two initiatives not because they have similar names but
because of their striking influence in the social media.
Friends of Turkana (friendsofturkana.org) is concerned that the completion of the Omo River Dam in Ethiopia that would largely affect the community living in the Lake Turkana region. They have been protesting and sensitizing the locals on this matter. They managed to stall the project but it is now 70% complete so they seem to be changing track as the dam will be build and they now have a huge task at hand to try maintain
the culture that will soon be forgotten. They feel that since Lake Turkana is in the world's largest desert and this is about to change.
Friends of Maasai Mara (friendsofmaasaimara.org) on the other is concerned with the level of poaching that is taking place at Maasai Mara Game Reserve.
I was with the founder of the organization last week as I watched one of their freshly pressed story trend online. It was quite a noble cause to see the effort of a university be appreciated by the world. He and his team had been at the site where they had discovered 117 elephant carcases.
I must admit that after hanging out with these two parties. I was impressed. So my question to UNEA is:
How do youths and education institutions get to build capacity?








