Carbon trade to gain momentum with new technology

By Fredrick Obura

The Government has been challenged to make public data generated from remote sensing technology it has adopted in mapping forests.

Last week, through the Kenya Forest Department, the State adopted a remote sensing technology to aid in accurate mapping of forests in the country. Exact details such as biomass in the forest would easily be availed to facilitate carbon trade. 

Forest stakeholders welcomed the new technology but asked the Government to make the information easily available to members of the public for participatory forest management as per the new rules. “We already have key institutions such as surveys of Kenya, Department of Remote Sensing and Resource Surveys and Regional centre for remote sensing that have capacity to generate critical information for managing forests, the challenge has always been access to information generated,”  Rudolph Makhanu, the National Co-ordinator, Kenya Forest Working Group, said.  “Basic forest resource; land use and land cover information should not be categorized as sensitive and locked out of the public domain, and measures should be put in place to facilitate access to generated information and data to stakeholders in the forest sector,” he said.

He noted that ready and easily accessible information would make it possible to members of the public to participate in forest management as required by new forest laws. Through the help of World Bank and Japan, the Kenya Forest Service acquired a modern national forest cover mapping system for accurate reporting on the status of forests. The new system uses remote sensing technology mapping out various activities in the forest, as a package it comes with a website where the information collected can easily be accessed online by members.