A co-management plan will be developed by COMRED with significant input from the community.
Awareness material will include pamphlets, psters, t-shirts, a documentary and sign boards.
Gender Focus
Gender mainstreaming will be addressed to encourage equal gender participation. The composition stands at 22% of omen participating (coastal culture/religion subordinates women and discourages them from participating in marine activities, especially fishing).
Project sustainability
Project management indicated plans to mobilise funds for more activities to enable a continued presence at the two project sites of Msambweni and Munje. Further they outlined specific actions that they had undertaken to enhance sustainability of project activities and results:-
i. Sustained sensitisation and awareness raising amongst the wider community was expected to outlive the CMA beyond the life of the project.
ii. A draft co-management plan, complete with an implementation plan had been drawn and was in the final stages of review. The plan is expected to outline farther steps in enhancing sustainability of the CMA going forward
iii. Another way to ehance the co-management area was through the proposed establishment of a co-management committee that will be in-charge of management of the co-management area
Measures planned by project partners revolve around the enhancemenet of the co-management area:-
i. KMFRI in conjunction with COMRED played a significant role in training and equipping community members with valuable skills on ecological monitoring of the CMAs. It is hoped that the trained Team can continue to monitor progress of improvement of ecological conditions of the protected area.
ii. As a result of engagement of he Kwale County Fisheries Office by project management has given rise to a closer coopeartion from the county. The county office is expected to continue with the support towards CMAs and combat illegal fishing at the sites.
Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods
The target tourist destination that the MTMCG boat is used for will be nearer and profitable. The renovation of the deck, repainting and purchase of life saving equipment as well as other necessities will enhance the efficacy of the boat while also addressing sustainability.
Capacity - Building Component
There will be increased awareness amongst the community about marine resources and threats.
Project Results
i. The project is estimated to have directly benefitted about 88 beneficiaries who constitute registered Munje BMU and MTMCG members and another 1,500 beneficiaries in the wider community benefitting indirectly. These benefits include; the availability of a community resource centre and boat at MTMCG that could be used for meetings by the wider community and rescue for capsized fishing boats respectively. The Munje CMA is also expected to increase benefits to fishers, traders and fish processors in the long run in form of sustainable increased catches. The MTMCG boat has also facilitated other external support partners to come and assist the community in various programmes
ii. Awareness sessions are estimated to have reached at least 500 residents within both Munje and MTMCG areas of operations. MTMCG alone conducted awareness sessions specifically on the new Wildlife Act and the BMU regulations and reached 82 persons at Munje, 102 at Mwandamu, 64 at Mkunguni and 36 at Mwaembe. However perhaps the project could have reached more people had they used pamplets to increase reach of people reached and awareness done in villages not landing sites alone as observed by the project management
iii. There was also a marked increase in cooperation with BMUs especially on MCS. Active BMUs on MCS include; Mwandamu, Mkunguni, Mwaembe and Munje BMUs.
iv. Experiential learning through exchange visits to Kuruwitu and Wasini was an important impact of the project. The visit focused on how Kuruwitu and Wasini started their CMAs, challenges and their current benefits. The trip involved fishers with most opposition to establishment of CMAs as a way of getting their buy-in once they got convinced about the usefulness of the CMA. This yielded results by changing the opposing fishers into champions of CMAs and even participated in MCS patrols. They also understood that the CMA was meant to be a community run conservation area and not a government run marine park
v. Beneficiaries attained useful skills from the project such as underwater monitoring, houselhold surveys and project management. Women have also been involved in leadership e.g. the chair of the PIC was a woman, and hence personal growth of women participating in the project. MCS training by Kwale County Directorate of Fisheries was also useful in imparting new skills amongst the newly established MCS Committee members. These skills included; arresting procedures, enforcement strategies, evidence collection and patrolling.
Benefits to Munje BMU beneficiaries has been slow and intangible owing to the nature of activities implemnented. The main expected result of the project on Munje side was to establish a CMA to protect biodiversity. This certainly was not expected to provide quick benefits within the life of the project and the beneficiaries seem to have understood this fact. However in the long run their expected outcome is to have sustainable fish production emanating from spill-overs from the CMA. This not oustanding, nevertheless there are a few short term impacts experienced at Munje as explained below:-
i. There has been a gradual change in the way the Munje community perceives a conservation area; from a government restricted zone to a community benefit area. They have largely accepted the idea of a closure and seems motivated to conserve marine resources due to expected CMA benefits in the future
ii. There were also marked ecosystem changes even in the short term. Beneficiaries reported that since the establishment of the CMA-- there is now new fish mass building up and recently octopus catches around the CMA have reportedly increased in number and size (see pictures in the end) Some fishes whose populations had declined severely or no longer seen, were now coming back especially the parrotfish family.
