Today marks the 10th day since I started the 17th Elephant Campaign Walk edition dubbed “Ivory Belongs to Elephants “- Tsavo East- Shimba Hills and Usambara ecosystem . So far, I have walked 190 KM and held 29 meetings along the way, from Voi to Kinango.

Yesterday morning, my team and I were flagged off at Kinango town by Kinango Deputy County Commissioner accompanied by Sub-County security committee (OCPD, KWS et al). As a community we must identify a coping mechanism on how to coexist with wildlife and notably elephants ~ Mr. Charles Deputy County Commissioner.

Kinango is adjacent to Mwalunganje community Elephant sanctuary. This sanctuary was established in the mid 90’s by Kenya Wildlife Service and aimed at supporting the Shimba hills ecosystem by connecting Marere forest and Shimba Hills. Kenya Wildlife Service plans to bring 15 elephants in the name of re-wilding program from a zoo in UK. The rationale behind this is to distribute the elephant genes and to diversify tourism attraction in Mwalunganje elephant sanctuary.

I encourage community (Youth, women and men) to be strategic and identify opportunities through this project, in my emphasis I ask community(ies) to form groups either Community Based Organisations (CBOs) or self – help groups that may attract conservation and environmental donors. These groups may target landscape restoration and improve livelihoods such as bee keeping, poultry farming among others. We live in the world we didn’t create, so we have no right to destroy it or decide who’s going to live here ~ Jim Justus Nyamu