Can blockchain help conserve Kenya's Masai Mara?

People from across the world flock to Kenya’s Masai Mara — one of the world’s most prized pieces of conserved land — to see its rolling plains dotted with herds of elephants, elusive leopards, and iconic migrating wildebeest.

But the picturesque landscape is tainted by stark inequalities. It’s home to the Masai, a pastoralist community that has long served as keepers of the land. And while the world’s wealthy spend exorbitant amounts to intimately witness wildlife, Masai communities largely receive pittance for their role in conserving the land.

For these communities, conservation is complicated. The value of wildlife is not always apparent. Elephants are a menace, destroying crops and property, and lions prey on livestock and kill people. When land is conserved, it’s largely not available for livestock grazing or agriculture. And people can’t build structures or fence off that land. 

But some in the technology sector hope blockchain — a platform that allows for the movement of information and money documented by a record that can’t be altered — could rectify some of these problems, creating a decentralized, transparent flow of cash to those involved in conservation in the Masai Mara — which could ultimately increase the flow of funding from a broader base of donors.

"Blockchain is a great solution for anything that covers the last mile: whether it's last mile payment, last mile transportation, and logistics. Anything that requires a way to track and trace in the most transparent and secure way," said Kate Kallot, co-founder and chief impact officer at Mara, an African digital finance ecosystem.

Wildlife teeters on the edge in Kenya. The country hosts nearly 140 endangered or threatened species and it’s lost nearly 70% of its wildlife in the past four decades. The national and county governments manage wildlife in national parks and reserves, but the majority of migratory animals need more space to thrive. 

An elephant, for example, needs 150 liters of water and grazes for up to 16 hours each day, said Dickson Kaelo, the CEO of the Kenya Wildlife Conservancies Association.

"For it to survive, it needs huge spaces," he said. "Other animals like cheetahs have to walk 30 kilometers on a single day. They cannot be contained in small fences and really flourish."

And climate change pushes animals further to find resources as rangeland dries up, he added.

Only about 38% of Kenya’s wildlife is in government-designated areas, Kaelo said, and because of this, conservation must extend beyond these areas. The majority of the nation’s wildlife exists on community and private land.

Conservancies — which include leased land from private and group landowners or communities, such as the Masai, to tourism operators — supplement government-managed land. Funds to conservancies also pay rangers and some community projects. Instead of developing their land and using it for grazing livestock, communities are paid for conservation.

Models for conservancies vary, including how much landowners are paid. In the Mara Siana Conservancy, for example, landowners are nine years into a 15-year contract where they receive only 1,300 Kenyan shillings (about $11) per acre each year — each of them have 6.5 acres of land included in this agreement — and they are allowed to graze livestock three times a year, typically for around a month each, according to Samwel Kararei, a finance and administration officer at the conservancy. 

“It’s very little money,” he said.

For people in Mara Siana with more land outside of those 6.5 acres (3 hectares), the Worldwide Wildlife Fund also pays them the same amount per acre annually to not fence land they own outside conservancies so that corridors — tracts of land animals pass through — are uninterrupted. It is estimated that nearly 20% of the Mara is already fenced and one part of the region has seen a 740% increase in fencing in recent years.

Other benefits include employment opportunities for community members at conservancies or lodges, bursary funds for students, and $20 charged for each tourist, per night that is distributed among landowners, Kararei said.

If a landowner were to breach the deal, they would need to pay the conservancy for the time left in the term.

This income from leased land is in addition to the sale of livestock and milk, Kaelo said.

But the system is imperfect. Half of the people in 32 counties with wildlife across Kenya live in poverty and unemployment drives poaching, Kaelo said. Funding flowing from tourism operators and other global conservation donations are subject to human influence, leaving room for corruption. Chiefs or conservancy associations might fudge numbers and siphon money. Fees are also attached, such as from banks or international transfers, which further diminishes funding that makes its way to landowners. 

“You need the transparency that goes all the way to the last mile,” Kallot said.

If disgruntled landowners feel they don’t receive a fair share, they might use the land for agriculture, grazing, or development rather than conservation.

The system is also overly dependent on tourism — which came to a standstill at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic — questioning the sustainability of the conservancy model and underscoring the need to further diversify incomes.

As their maiden project, Mara Foundation called out to innovators across the continent for blockchain proposals to solve problems surrounding last-mile payments in the Mara. Over 800 people from more than 24 countries submitted applications and finalists were narrowed to eight groups of three.

They were flown to the Mara where they spent a week hacking out prototypes for a blockchain product — immersed in wildlife at Ishara Mara, a sustainable resort. Hippopotami traipsed down the river in front of their tents, elephants encircled the compound, and lions roared throughout the night.

A perennial problem in the tech space is the creation of applications nobody uses. Some 35% of startups fail because there’s no market for them. To avoid this trap, participants were urged to tune into the needs of the Masai community while crafting their product — making it easy to use as well as a product that fits into the ways the community already operates.

After two days of hacking, they traveled to Mara Siana Conservancy to relay their ideas to community members — then adjusted product design. It’s an opportunity not always accessible for participants in hackathons, as many are held virtually. 

The foundation hopes whatever solution is built for the Mara is scalable to other conservation areas on the continent, Kallot said. 

"We're trying to use the structure that the Mara provides and build technology that can be applied in places without that structure," she said.

By the end of the week, teams had a business plan, road map, and working prototype of a product, which they pitched to judges.

Solutions ranged from allowing conservancies to directly appeal to international donors for projects to supporting the diversification of incomes — such as through beadworking and beekeeping.

The top three winning teams were from Nigeria. The first-place winners — Patience Adajah, Tide Ayoade, and Segun Abisagbo — focused their product around NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, which is a record on the blockchain tied to physical or digital assets, used to incentivize donations.

Judges said signs of a sustainable business model with growth potential weighed more heavily on decisions than the tech — although that too had to be strong.

The foundation gave the winning teams a total of $100,000 — in cash and in kind, such as travel and engineering support — to lay the groundwork for a startup. They are enrolled in a three-month incubator with Antler, an early-stage venture capital and startup-building firm that will guide them on scaling. At the end of the program, the groups will present their product to the firm’s investment team for a chance at more funding.

These efforts build off another project in the Niger Delta, where Nnadi is originally from — an area heavily polluted by oil extraction. 

Despite funding allocated toward cleanups, the environment is still a mess. Large settlements intended for social good were directed to villages in bulk — for building health clinics, roads, and compensation to residents. Instead, some elders hoarded money and bought luxury cars and satellite dishes, Nnadi said, adding that because of this “trust is expensive.”

“You're really dealing with broken down barriers of social contracts and trust,” he said.

Nnadi and his team developed a blockchain solution that hired local militants who were previously bombing pipelines to instead clean community fish ponds and plant mangroves. They used a smart contract with triple layers of verification. Ex-militants would send pictures of project progress and women farmers would send pictures from the same geolocation, which was coupled with satellite imagery. When the evidence agreed, they were paid.

But the project was ahead of its time, Nnadi said.

“​​Frankly, we were too early for the technology. Stablecoins didn't exist en masse the same way they do now and you need that for the smart contract,” he said.

There weren’t wallets for people to cash out the cryptocurrency they received into naira. Instead, Nnadi’s team physically paid them. Crypto wallets and stablecoins, such as USD Coin, have evolved significantly since then, Nnadi said.

“We're now in a different place where the technologies are actually ready for it,” he said. 

Note: The Mara Foundation facilitated travel for this reporting. Devex retains full editorial independence.

Photos by: Sara Jerving
Produced by: Janelle Cruz