Kenya Lifts Logging Ban, Promising Jobs and GrowthThe 2018 ban led to the loss of approximately 44,000 jobs and $28 million in revenue.
WILLIAM RAMPE
7.10.2023
On July 2, Kenya's president ended an almost six-year moratorium on logging in the country's public and community forests.
"We can't have mature trees rotting in forests while locals suffer due to lack of timber. That's foolishness," President William Ruto explained during a church service. "This is why we have decided to open up the forest and harvest timber so that we can create jobs for our youth and open up business."
In 2018, when he was deputy president, Ruto announced a 90-day ban in order "to allow reassessment and rationalisation of the entire forest sector." The government regularly extended the ban as part of an effort to limit illegal logging and prevent the lowering of Kenya's water levels.
While lifting the ban, Ruto is maintaining Kenya's goal of planting 15 billion trees over the next 10 years. The Kenya Forest Service (KFS) has also set rules for harvesting in gazetted forests, including requiring loggers to acquire entry and exit certificates.
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According to the Kenya Forestry Research Institute, the 2018 ban led to the loss of approximately 44,000 jobs and $28 million in revenue, bringing economic collapse to communities that relied on the logging industry.*
Ruto's decision has set off a storm of environmentalist anger, with activists accusing Kenya of favoring economic development over its climate goals. John Kioli, the executive director of the Green Africa Foundation, told the Associated Press that he didn't expect the president to achieve his tree-planting goal and that lifting the ban would "undermine all efforts to put Kenya on a low-carbon trajectory."
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Source:
https://reason.com/2023/07/10/kenya-lifts-logging-ban-promising-jobs-and-growth/
