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Mt. Elgon Benet Area
The current aim of the project is to “promote community
development and conserve Mount Elgon’s ecosystem
for present and future use” using a “community
based resource management approach” involving the
participation and empowerment of local communities
in the development process (MECDP, 1995). Working
in conjunction with MENP, park regulations have been
formulated with reference to the needs of local people
and their resource use levels, and enforced in conjunction
with a comprehensive extension programme. Collaborative
management was piloted in two parishes, with the aim
of extending it to all forest-adjacent parishes before the
project ends in 2000.
IUCN have commissioned a number of resource
inventories and assessments. Katende et al. (1990)
carried out a biodiversity inventory for woody perennials
and birds. A Land Mapping and Biodiversity Survey of
Mount Elgon National Park was carried out in 1993 to
assist the development of a long term management plan
(van Heist, 1994). The survey described numerous aspects
of the mountain with an emphasis on plant biodiversity. A
“resource use assessment” was commissioned for the same
purpose detailing resource use by people groups across the
mountain through a series of semi-structured interviews
and group discussions (Scott, 1994).
A number of forest dwellers still live in the park.
They are primarily pastoralists, practising subsistence
agriculture in gardens next to their houses. Prior to
cultivation, the areas are burnt and cow dung is added
to the soil to fertilise it. The gardens are then planted
for two or three years. The high altitude prohibits the
production of maize, but potatoes (
Solanum tuberosum
)
and matoke (
Musa sapientum
) are widely grown. When
the evictions occurred, many of these gardens and
grazing areas around them were abandoned. Immediately
after the 1990 evictions the forest was lacking the dense
shrub layer characteristic of East African upper montane
forests (Richards, 1996) and extensive areas of top-soil
were exposed due to the activity of cattle (Katende,
A. pers. comm.). The current pastoralists concentrate
grazing activity on the Benet grasslands which meander
through the forest at an altitude of approximately 2,500
- 2,800 m. It is not certain whether the Benet grasslands
have always been open grassy areas (van Heist, 1994)
but they are maintained as artificial climax by heavy
grazing. A number of cattle graze in the forest, but they
are fewer in number than before the evictions. Although
the Ndorobos live illegally in the area they are tolerated
by the National Park authorites who are currently deciding
whether to relocate them.
Dawn at the Mt. Elgon Ranges (2008)
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