Audio By Vocalize
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.
But as Sir Partha Dasgupta argues in his seminal research on the economics of biodiversity, the human economy is embedded within nature, not external to it. Following that logic, the people who steward that nature are not peripheral beneficiaries of conservation economies – they are foundational investors in them. And this reality is becoming even more visible globally.
New findings presented earlier this month at the Business of Conservation Conference by Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) highlighted how deeply businesses and financial systems depend on biodiversity – and that biodiversity loss is now emerging as a systemic risk to the global economy itself.
Correcting this imbalance is both economically necessary and a matter of social justice. Aligning power, risk, and returns with those who sustain the ecosystems on which conservation depends is now an imperative, especially at a moment when global investment is accelerating into biodiversity credits, carbon markets and nature-based investment.
Kenya illustrates both the promise and the tension in this model. Across the country, more than 200 community conservancies now manage landscapes that sustain wildlife and tourism. According to the Kenya Wildlife Conservancies Association, these conservancies generated over Sh4 billion in economic value as of 2022. In places like the Maasai Mara and across northern Kenya, conservancies support employment, land leases, education, water access, and local enterprise development.
But what communities contribute to this economy goes far beyond the financial benefits that are often highlighted. And the returns that they receive are not commensurate with that investment.
In reality, communities contribute the basic resource – the land itself. They maintain wildlife habitat instead of subdividing or converting it. They absorb the daily realities of living with wildlife: Livestock predation, crop loss and restrictions on land use. They invest time and governance capacity to manage conservancies and negotiate partnerships.
Communities also bring a deep understanding of ecological constraints – something often overlooked in conservation finance. Wildlife populations cannot expand indefinitely, especially in human-dominated landscapes. Rangelands cannot sustain unlimited tourism pressure.
Fisheries collapse when extraction exceeds regeneration. Community stewardship decisions are based on these realities and often shaped not by maximising short-term income but by maintaining balance across generations. This ecological knowledge represents another form of capital that communities contribute as investors.
Private investors and operators bring equally important inputs – financial capital, infrastructure, marketing networks, and access to global tourism markets. But without the natural capital safeguarded sustainably on community land, there is no tourism product to sell, no biodiversity credit to issue, and no conservation enterprise to finance.
Encouragingly, a shift has started to take shape in parts of Kenya. In conservancies such as Naboisho and Olare Motorogi in the Maasai Mara, communities are increasingly treated not as beneficiaries but as equity partners in conservation enterprises.
Landowners collectively pool thousands of hectares into conservancies that function much like a capital investment: The land and its biodiversity become the core asset on which tourism businesses depend.
These models demonstrate that when communities are treated as investors, incentives align toward long-term stewardship. But they remain the exception rather than the rule.
It is important to emphasise that recognising communities as investors does not romanticise local governance. Communities, like corporations and governments, can make poor decisions or face internal conflict. But these outcomes rarely occur in isolation. They are often shaped by market dysfunction – specifically, distorted incentives, insecure tenure, opaque contracts, or unequal bargaining power.
When communities contribute the foundational asset while receiving uncertain and/or inadequate returns and limited governance authority, the incentive structure itself becomes misaligned. In such cases, degradation can become economically rational. That is not a failure of communities. It is a failure of economic design.
This design challenge is becoming more urgent as conservation finance expands globally.
Carbon markets, biodiversity credits, and blended finance partnerships are attracting growing attention from investors seeking nature-based solutions. These instruments offer real opportunity, including diversification beyond tourism through enterprises such as conservation-linked livestock markets, beekeeping, and other nature-based businesses. But scaling finance without correcting power imbalances risks scaling inequity as well.
Kenya has long been recognised globally for pioneering community-based conservation. To remain a leader, conservation enterprises must go beyond wildlife numbers or tourism revenue towards an economic model that is consistently fair, just, and durable.
This requires a shift in how conservation partnerships are designed. In practice, agreements must be structured as genuine partnerships that appropriately value the capital that communities are investing; ensure financial reporting and governance aligned with capital contribution; and price community risk, including human-wildlife conflict and land-use opportunity costs, so that returns are commensurate
Kenya’s Community Land Act and the ongoing review of the Wildlife Act offer important opportunities to reinforce and embed these principles in policy and practice. In parallel, there is a need to strengthen community institutions and the civil society organisations that support them so they can negotiate effectively with commercial partners.
Support Independent Journalism
Stand With Bold Journalism.
Stand With The Standard.
Continue
→
Pay via
Secure Payment
Kenya’s most trusted newsroom since 1902
Follow The Standard
channel on WhatsApp
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.
But as Sir Partha Dasgupta argues in his seminal research on the economics of biodiversity, the human economy is embedded within nature, not external to it. Following that logic, the people who steward that nature are not peripheral beneficiaries of conservation economies – they are foundational investors in them. And this reality is becoming even more visible globally.
New findings presented earlier this month at the Business of Conservation Conference by Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) highlighted how deeply businesses and financial systems depend on biodiversity – and that biodiversity loss is now emerging as a systemic risk to the global economy itself.
Correcting this imbalance is both economically necessary and a matter of social justice. Aligning power, risk, and returns with those who sustain the ecosystems on which conservation depends is now an imperative, especially at a moment when global investment is accelerating into biodiversity credits, carbon markets and nature-based investment.
Kenya illustrates both the promise and the tension in this model. Across the country, more than 200 community conservancies now manage landscapes that sustain wildlife and tourism. According to the Kenya Wildlife Conservancies Association, these conservancies generated over Sh4 billion in economic value as of 2022. In places like the Maasai Mara and across northern Kenya, conservancies support employment, land leases, education, water access, and local enterprise development.
But what communities contribute to this economy goes far beyond the financial benefits that are often highlighted. And the returns that they receive are not commensurate with that investment.
In reality, communities contribute the basic resource – the land itself. They maintain wildlife habitat instead of subdividing or converting it. They absorb the daily realities of living with wildlife: Livestock predation, crop loss and restrictions on land use. They invest time and governance capacity to manage conservancies and negotiate partnerships.
Communities also bring a deep understanding of ecological constraints – something often overlooked in conservation finance. Wildlife populations cannot expand indefinitely, especially in human-dominated landscapes. Rangelands cannot sustain unlimited tourism pressure.
Fisheries collapse when extraction exceeds regeneration. Community stewardship decisions are based on these realities and often shaped not by maximising short-term income but by maintaining balance across generations. This ecological knowledge represents another form of capital that communities contribute as investors.
Private investors and operators bring equally important inputs – financial capital, infrastructure, marketing networks, and access to global tourism markets. But without the natural capital safeguarded sustainably on community land, there is no tourism product to sell, no biodiversity credit to issue, and no conservation enterprise to finance.
Encouragingly, a shift has started to take shape in parts of Kenya. In conservancies such as Naboisho and Olare Motorogi in the Maasai Mara, communities are increasingly treated not as beneficiaries but as equity partners in conservation enterprises.
Landowners collectively pool thousands of hectares into conservancies that function much like a capital investment: The land and its biodiversity become the core asset on which tourism businesses depend.
These models demonstrate that when communities are treated as investors, incentives align toward long-term stewardship. But they remain the exception rather than the rule.
It is important to emphasise that recognising communities as investors does not romanticise local governance. Communities, like corporations and governments, can make poor decisions or face internal conflict. But these outcomes rarely occur in isolation. They are often shaped by market dysfunction – specifically, distorted incentives, insecure tenure, opaque contracts, or unequal bargaining power.
Stay informed. Subscribe to our newsletter
When communities contribute the foundational asset while receiving uncertain and/or inadequate returns and limited governance authority, the incentive structure itself becomes misaligned. In such cases, degradation can become economically rational. That is not a failure of communities. It is a failure of economic design.
This design challenge is becoming more urgent as conservation finance expands globally.
Carbon markets, biodiversity credits, and blended finance partnerships are attracting growing attention from investors seeking nature-based solutions. These instruments offer real opportunity, including diversification beyond tourism through enterprises such as conservation-linked livestock markets, beekeeping, and other nature-based businesses. But scaling finance without correcting power imbalances risks scaling inequity as well.
Kenya has long been recognised globally for pioneering community-based conservation. To remain a leader, conservation enterprises must go beyond wildlife numbers or tourism revenue towards an economic model that is consistently fair, just, and durable.
This requires a shift in how conservation partnerships are designed. In practice, agreements must be structured as genuine partnerships that appropriately value the capital that communities are investing; ensure financial reporting and governance aligned with capital contribution; and price community risk, including human-wildlife conflict and land-use opportunity costs, so that returns are commensurate
Kenya’s Community Land Act and the ongoing review of the Wildlife Act offer important opportunities to reinforce and embed these principles in policy and practice. In parallel, there is a need to strengthen community institutions and the civil society organisations that support them so they can negotiate effectively with commercial partners.
Follow The Standard
channel on WhatsApp
By Salisha Chandra