It's time for Kenya to rethink the business of conservation

Trans Nzoia residents participating in tree planting exercise to protect Lumuli dam. [File, Standard]

Approximately 80 per cent of Africa's land is under some form of community stewardship or customary tenure, and more than 60 per cent of people depend directly on natural resources for their livelihoods. Nature on this continent is not an abstract environmental concern - it is economic infrastructure supporting livelihoods, businesses and wellbeing.

Yet within commercial conservation enterprises, the people who steward these landscapes are still routinely described and treated as downstream "beneficiaries" rather than upstream investors. And this has shaped how the "business of conservation" has grown, how contracts are written, how incentives are shared, and who holds the power in these relationships.