Meet the Indigenous women restoring Kenya’s Mau Forest — and reshaping gender roles

Before dawn breaks over Eor Ewaso, a village in southwestern Kenya, Judy Mukut is already awake. By 6:30 a.m., she has fetched water, milked the family’s cattle, prepared breakfast, cleaned the house and seen her children off to school. Only then does she leave home for a resource center run by the Paran Indigenous women’s organization, where another day’s conservation work begins.

For Mukut, conservation of the Mau Forest is squeezed into the few hours left after fulfilling the responsibilities expected of her as a Maasai wife and mother. Yet it is this balancing act that reflects a quieter transformation taking place across one of Kenya’s most important forest ecosystems.

As Indigenous women restore degraded sections of the Mau Forest, they are also earning independent incomes, participating in household decisions and reviving traditional ecological knowledge that once sustained their communities for generations before going dormant.

Founded in 2005, the Paran Women Group has grown into a network of 64 registered Indigenous women’s groups, mostly drawn from Maasai and Ogiek communities in Narok county, as well as communities in West Pokot and Samburu counties. Through community-managed tree nurseries, kitchen gardens, village savings groups, beekeeping and landscape restoration, the organization has linked environmental conservation with women’s empowerment.

To coordinate its expanding network, Paran established seven community resource centers. Rather than functioning as offices, the centers serve as demonstration sites where women raise seedlings, receive technical training and exchange traditional knowledge.

“The work has taught us how to organize ourselves,” Mukut said. “Even with all the responsibilities at home, we have learned that if we plan our day well, we can still attend meetings, take care of our families and contribute to restoring the environment. We are no longer waiting for other people to make decisions because we know our contribution matters.”

Research increasingly supports such approaches. A 2025 study by CIFOR-ICRAF (now operating as Landscape Alliance) found that restoration programs intentionally designed to transform unequal gender relations strengthen women’s participation in household decision-making while improving long-term restoration outcomes.

Restoring forests, rebuilding livelihoods

For Nancy Letina, chairperson of Namaiyana Women’s Group within the Paran network, joining the collective in 2021 transformed not only how she viewed conservation but also her family’s economic future.

“Previously, as Maasai women, we depended on our husbands for everything, even household items like salt,” Letina said. But in 2019, that changed after her husband died, leaving her as the breadwinner with the responsibility to provide for her four children.

The first two years after losing her husband were difficult. Together with a handful of women facing similar hardships from Olomaiayana-Iltirben village in Melelo ward, Letina formed a self-help group that supported members during times of need. Their fortunes began to change when the group joined Paran and received training in sustainable livelihood activities.

“We gained knowledge that showed us that every woman can also fend for herself. Today, women have their own income. We can pay school fee arrears when our children are sent home and respond to emergencies without waiting for assistance.”

Her group currently manages a 0.2-hectare (half-acre) tree nursery where they grow indigenous species such as the African olive (Olea europaea subsp. africana), valued in forest restoration for supporting biodiversity and also widely used in traditional medicine, which they periodically supply to Paran. Letina’s group has sold 10,600 indigenous tree seedlings to the organization since joining. One seedling goes for 20 shillings ($0.15). The proceeds support both members and group activities.

Members also operate village savings and loans programs where weekly contributions are as low as 100 shillings ($0.77), allowing women to borrow 2,000-8,000 shillings (about $15-$60) during emergencies. The loans help families pay school fees, invest in small businesses or purchase livestock without resorting to cutting trees for charcoal or harvesting timber.

Additionally, Esther Kigen, a Masi group member, stressed that Paran’s training on women’s rights has encouraged them to participate in family decisions that had traditionally been reserved for men.

“Before, a man could sell livestock without informing anyone because everything belonged to him,” Kigen said.

“Now many families sit together before major decisions are made. Women are consulted because they also contribute to the well-being of the household.” This statement closely reflects findings from a 2021 study, which found that decisions about adopting land restoration practices are often initiated by women but become more successful when households make decisions jointly, highlighting how gender dynamics shape restoration outcomes.

Changes in the local environment

The women also credit years of restoration with improving local environmental conditions. “As the Mau Forest became increasingly degraded, rainfall grew more erratic and the Ewaso Ng’iro River carried less water,” Letina said. “Today, we are seeing cleaner water and better rainfall. We know many people have contributed to restoring the forest, and we are proud that our work is part of that recovery.”

Lorna Nyaga, a social scientist and research officer with Landscape Alliance, explained that such observations should ideally be supported by research. Restored forests can eventually improve soil structure, reduce erosion and increase water infiltration, which may help recharge streams and rivers, she said. However, she cautioned that it’s difficult to evaluate Paran’s restoration project without baseline data and long-term monitoring.

“The community’s observations are important, but the question is: Is there data to back it? If we don’t have a baseline, it’s difficult to confidently attribute those changes to the restoration itself,” she said.

Nyaga added that community observations and scientific monitoring should complement one another rather than compete.

Traditional healing

For Ntoiye Kimorgo of Naretoi Women’s Group, restoration is equally about protecting Indigenous knowledge.

A traditional herbal practitioner, she encourages every woman in her group to plant native medicinal trees alongside vegetables because they remain central to Maasai healthcare and culture.

“These trees have always helped us treat different illnesses,” Kimorgo revealed. “If they disappear, we lose more than a forest. We lose knowledge that has been passed from our grandparents to us. Every woman in our group has planted medicinal trees because we know their value.”

Their group’s kitchen gardens produce kales, jute mallow (Corchorus olitorius), amaranth and other traditional Kenyan vegetables that improve household nutrition while generating additional income through local markets.

Paran’s executive director, Naiyan Kiplagat, said the organization’s work has always been about more than restoring degraded forests. From the outset, it sought to address the environmental and social challenges facing Indigenous women simultaneously, recognizing that lasting conservation would be difficult without strengthening the communities that depend on the forest.

Designing restoration around women’s daily realities, Kiplagat said, has been one of the organization’s defining principles. “These women are the primary caretakers of their families and that is why we established nutritional gardens and tree nurseries close to their homes. They can improve their family’s nutrition, earn an income and restore degraded landscapes without abandoning their responsibilities at home.”

Unlike many restoration initiatives that prioritize fast-growing exotic trees, Paran focuses almost exclusively on indigenous species that once dominated the Mau ecosystem. Its nurseries raise species including the African olive as well as Warburgia ugandensis, Syzygium guineense, Markhamia lutea, Croton megalocarpus and other native medicinal trees that support biodiversity while preserving cultural traditions.

For Kiplagat, who is Ogiek and connected to the Maasai community through marriage, protecting those species also means protecting the Indigenous knowledge associated with them.

“We believe in traditional knowledge, innovation and collective action,” she said. “If our elders leave without passing that knowledge to the younger generation, then we lose something very important. Conservation is not only about planting trees. It is also about making sure our children understand why those trees matter.”

Older women therefore mentor younger members through storytelling, seed collection, nursery management and demonstrations on the medicinal uses of native plants. Some specialize in identifying indigenous seeds, while others teach sustainable harvesting techniques or environmental education within their communities.

That philosophy has increasingly attracted some international support. In 2023, Kiplagat said, Paran secured $100,000 through TerraFund under the AFR100 Landscapes program, an initiative supported by the World Resources Institute, to restore degraded land in the Mau Forest. Since the project began, women working with the organization have planted 200,000 indigenous tree seedlings, with maintenance work continuing as the trees become established. The six year-project is expected to end in 2029.

The organization is also implementing a separate restoration project supported through the United Nations Development Programme Climate Promise, which combines agroforestry and community resilience activities. Women are trained in establishing nurseries and given materials like paper tubes, for use in planting trees and seedlings that are later transplanted into women’s kitchen gardens.

Women are also trained to make energy-saving cooking stoves, locally known as jikos, which sell for 300 shillings ($2.30) each, and briquettes, which sell for 70 shillings ($0.50) per kilogram (2.2 pounds).

Kiplagat said the projects have demonstrated that Indigenous women can successfully lead large-scale restoration when they have financial and technical support. Paran’s success has also gained global recognition, including the Gender Justice Climate Solutions Award presented during COP28 in Dubai in 2023.

Still, she said, funding remains the organization’s greatest challenge. Income generated from tree nurseries helps bridge some gaps, including supporting community initiatives such as a rescue shelter for girls at risk of female genital mutilation during school holidays (FGM is a deeply rooted cultural practice that is illegal but long held among the Maasai as a rite of passage).

“Our biggest challenge is resources, as there are many more women who want to work with us than we are currently able to support. We receive funding project by project, but community needs continue even after those projects end. Still, we believe that doing small things consistently over many years eventually creates bigger change,” Kiplagat said.

Interestingly, men have also started joining and creating groups affiliated with Paran after witnessing the impact the initiative has had on women in their communities. Vincent Leteipa, a 31-year-old Eor Ewaso villager, said he was inspired by women neighbors who joined the program and improved their livelihoods through kitchen gardening and tree nursery enterprises. “I got the motivation to become part of this community after seeing the results of the work of these women,” he said. Since joining in 2022, Leteipa has transitioned from casual construction work to owning a boda boda business, a change he attributes to his savings and income earned through the group’s activities. He said the additional income has also enabled him to build a house and keep his child in school.

Partnerships

The Kenya Forest Service (KFS) has become one of Paran’s closest technical partners, providing guidance on species selection, nursery establishment, site matching and restoration techniques while the women mobilize communities and raise indigenous seedlings.

Frederick Kibichi, a forester in Narok South sub-county, said the partnership has produced encouraging ecological results despite increasingly frequent droughts.

“They have assisted us greatly in conserving the environment,” noted Kibichi, who said KFS evaluates restoration success primarily through seedling survival rates rather than simply counting the number of trees planted.

“The survival count of their trees has remained above 50% despite the dry conditions because they follow technical guidance very closely.”

He added that Paran can further improve tree survival by carrying out a process known as “beating-up” in which dead seedlings are replaced with healthy ones of the same species during the next rainy season. He also recommended regular spot weeding to reduce competition from weeds, protecting the restoration sites from fire, grazing animals and illegal activities and conducting survival counts after replanting to ensure the sites achieve the desired tree stocking.

Beyond restoring forest blocks, Paran has also supplied indigenous seedlings for schools and community tree-planting activities. Humphrey Omollo, an assistant county commissioner for Ololulunga division in Narok South sub-county, said government participation in such activities helps strengthen community ownership while recognizing women as environmental leaders.

“When government officers join these restoration exercises, communities understand that this work belongs to everyone,” Omollo said. “Conservation is not about men or women. Healthy forests benefit the entire community, and these women have demonstrated that they can lead environmental restoration just as effectively as anyone else.”

Village elder Peter Muya has witnessed that shift over the years.

“When I was younger, leadership was almost entirely left to men,” Muya said. “Today, women are leading conservation groups, speaking in public meetings and helping families make important decisions. Not everyone has abandoned the old ways, but education and organizations like Paran have shown our community that women are equally capable of leading.”

Elder Muya’s statement is supported by a recent CIFOR-ICRAF report emphasizing community dialogues as effective tools for overcoming gender barriers in restoration because they help shift local attitudes rather than focusing only on restoration efforts.

For Mukut and hundreds of other Indigenous women, restoring the Mau Forest is about far more than repairing a damaged ecosystem. It is about creating livelihoods that reduce pressure on the forest, safeguarding traditional ecological knowledge and proving that conservation is strongest when the people who have lived alongside a landscape for generations are trusted to lead its recovery.

Banner image: Ntoiye Kimorgo, a Maasai traditional healer and member of the Paran-affiliated Naretoi group, explains the importance of growing indigenous trees for their medicinal properties. Image by Juliet Ojwang.

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Cite this article

Juliet Akoth Ojwang (2026). Meet the Indigenous women restoring Kenya’s Mau Forest — and reshaping gender roles. Mongabay Conservation news. DOI: https://doi.org/10.66709/news-325754