Simon Kosgei Choge 165development at woodcarving co-operative premises. The idea behind tree
nurseries is to encourage carvers to plant carving trees on their own land for
future use or for trading to other carvers. Four tree nurseries are already in
operation and supported by the MCC in collaboration with the Micro-Enterprises
Support Programme (MESP, under the European Union) and the Ten Thousands
Villages Programme. MCC is also working closely with woodcarvers to dry and
season the carving wood and products, develop and train carvers to develop
new product designs and to be more creative and innovative.
Through the People and Plants Initiative, a pilot certification program for
Azadirachta indica wood sourced from farmers around Malindi (the study area)
is being developed in collaboration with the Forest Stewardship Council and
Smart Wood Program of the Rainforest Alliance and Soil Association. Appropriate
eco-labels for carvings made from Azadirachta indica are also being considered.
Generally the impact of these programmes is such that the international markets
are learning much about the carving wood types available in Kenya and are
increasingly becoming conscious about conservation and hence the need for a
switch to buying products from sustainably managed and guaranteed sources.
The issue of resource development and scarcity aside, the heart and breath
of a sustainable woodcarving industry in Kenya largely hinges on a centralised
form of organisation of carvers in which their interests, and those of the industry
generally, are easily met. Well organised associations are likely to take full
advantage of the economies of scale in resource acquisition, access to credit
facilities, product marketing, standardisation of products and prices, customer
contacts and relations, customer confidence and the ease of donor interventions
among a wide range of other benefits. The setting up of the KCCU was intended
to do exactly that, but it is now overly mismanaged to the extent that it is
becoming increasingly irrelevant as carvers opt out to join other groups or
work independently. Lack of transparency in dealing with its supportive
development partners, donors and other organisations working closely with it
has been a great disservice to the carving community in recent years and has
caused major problems between them. This should not be allowed to continue.
The greatest dividends of the remaining organised associations are likely
to be realised through the improved marketing of carvings. The impact of
poor marketing under the current management scenario within the existing
co-operatives was demonstrated as shown in Table 2, with 75% of the products
remaining unsold^7.
These findings show that there is everything to be gained by remaining
organised and everything to be lost by encouraging destructive competition.
Owing to the current problems facing the co-operatives and the union, the
carving community and their leaders need to go back to the drawing board, do
some soul searching and formulate lasting solutions for their unity of purpose
in response to the changing trends in global economic climate, environmental
order and consumer behaviour and demands. In the interim, the bottom line
is that education of carvers about the country’s rapidly disappearing forests is
crucial, and more importantly, their individual and collective contribution
towards developing a sustainable industry to complement the efforts already
in place which exist for only one reason—to protect their interests and those
of their dependants.09woodcarving.p65 165 22/12/2004, 11:05