Transforming Arid Land into a Forest

We set on a foresting project in 2017/2018 in an area called Ol Maroroi in Kajiado West. The area was mostly semi-arid with very few trees. We planted gravelia trees and the Maroroi Tree in an area of about 3 acres to test and see how the area will be transformed. So, we started with the fencing trees - Bottle Brush species which is a very good windbreaker. The first picture shows the planting process in 2020 and the one after shows the growth progress in 2024. 

Later on we decided to fill a full acre of trees - a plan which was almost shunned by the community. Many said that our project would fail becuase the area lies on leeward side of the Ngong Hills which means rainfall is less compared to most of the areas around. This was the area in 2019 even before we put up a perimeter wall. 

In the picture above, this was the first tree that we planted in the land and within the month we planted several more (see below).

Eventually, we had filled the whole piece of land with various types of trees - croton, gravelia, cypress, bottle brush, podos, casaurinas and very many fruit trees - mulberry bushes, mango, guava, apple, avocado, lemon, orange trees and tree tomatoe bushes. 

From afar, we see the transformation that the project has given to the area where we see more green caanopies than brown earth beyond the stone wall.

This is  picture taken in November 2024 while inside the forest at Ol Maroroi.