| dc.description.abstract | Despite their importance, wetlands are facing a crisis due to anthropogenic factors as well
as natural phenomenas. One of the measures to address the challenges being faced by
wetlands is to develop indicators. Unforunately to date, indicator development has largely
been driven by the scientific community to the exclusion of the local people who are
dependent on these wetlands. Biophyisical assessments have thus dominated the indicator
development process which has led to these indicators largely being defined as indices,
making them difficult to comprehend on the part of the local communities. The overall
goal of the research was therefore to assess local perceptions on wetland environments
for the purposes of developing environmental indicators for effective management of
wetlands especially those that are designated as Important Bird Areas (IBAs) in Kenya.
In this regard the following objectives were addressed in this study a) establish the
influence of gender, age, type of resource use on community perspective on wetland
environmental indicators, 2) determine the state of wetland environments (SoE) and
predict their future changes from the local knowledge and community perspective on
wetland environmental indicators and 3) determine the Pressure-State-Response
indicators across different types of wetlands. The study tested the following hypotheses
in order to address the research objectives 1) gender, age and type of resource use are key
determinants in the perceptions and/or choices of the wetland environmental indicators
held by the respondents, 2) the local community perceptions about the condition of the
wetland IBAs are similar based on community perspective on wetland environmental
indicators and 3) the community identified indicators are influenced by the type of
wetland environment.
To arrive at a study sample size, the study considered the categorical nature of the data to be
collected. The study sets an alpha level priori at .05 and 5% margin of error is acceptable.
The Cochran‗s sample size formula for categorical data was used and 475 applied as the
appropriate sample size. The three types of wetlands considered in the study were 1) the Tana
Delta (for riverine IBAs), 2) Lake Bogoria (for saline lacustrine IBAs) and 3) Lake Naivasha
(for freshwater lacustrine IBAs). The justification for the purposive selection of these study
sites is that they are high on the priority list for both their conservation value and their human
health benefit. Both purposive and non-random sampling was used for selecting the villages
within which the community perception analysis was undertaken. The following villages
were considered in the study as platforms for analyzing community perceptions: 1) Tana
River Delta - Kipini, Ozi, Dida Waride, Moa 2) Lake Bogoria - Loboi, Sandai and Emsos and
3) Lake Naivasha - Kamere, Karagita and Kongoni. A total of 179 respondents were
interviewed at Tana Delta, 44 respondents at Lake Bogoria and 252 at Lake Naivasha. A total
of 12 different wetland user groups were sampled across three study sites. The respondents
were categorised according to the following six age groups; 15-25; 26-36; 37-47; 48-58-5969
and 70-80 years. Community interviews were mainly conducted through focus group
discussions according to the various user groups on site. Each focus group consisted of at
least 7 to 12 people and lasted not more than 2hrs. In total, 112 focus group discussions were
held. Individual interviews were also held, at least 32 key informant interviews were
conducted and this was complimented with direct observation in the field. The discussion
was conducted using a standard questionnaire which was structured according to the
Pressure, State, Response (PSR) framework. In analyzing the data, the study used non-
parametric tests to determine the level of significance through a Chi-Square Test, assess
whether differences exists between group by conducting a Kruskal-Wallis H test and
determining association between variables using the Spearman Rank Correlation Coefficient.
The main findings on the objective focusing on socio- demographics showed that the
perceptions on the state of the wetland environment were not influenced by the age of the
respondents. The study has also shown that the concern for the quality of the wetland IBAs is
not a gendered phenomenon. Overall, while gender and age did not influence the choice of
indicators, the type of resource use contributed to the kind of desired wetland environmental
indicators. The traditional healers, perhaps due to the entrenched historical links, affiliation
and in-depth specialization on herbal life, recorded a much deeper perception than the rest of
the resource users. Notably, the mean scores for the inland fishermen, agricultural farmers,
livestock herders were 1.992754, 1.72619 and 1.612903 respectively and these were slightly
higher than the perceptions of the other resource groups. On the second objective, the key
findings were that the wetland IBAs were in a deteriorating state; freshwater IBAs
seemingly were faced with intense pressures compared to the saline. Different
management regimes could also be a factor. The study rejects the null hypotheses that
perceptions on the condition were not similar. In total, at least 38 PSR indicators were
identified (19 Pressure; 7 State; 12 Responses). A chi-square test of goodness-of-fit
determined that the perceptions on PSR indicators from the IBA sites were not equally
distributed in the population (with the exception of the state indicator on fish resource at
Lake Naivasha). The Statistical Results showed that the community perceptions on the
PSR indicators were different across different communities. The selection of community
environmental indicators is not by chance hence the study rejects the Null Hypotheses
that the community identified indicators were not different.
The study concludes that the socio- demographics of a study population remain a key
component of any research work and should be utilised as much as possible in natural
resource management. The study has shown that the pressure indicators are relatively
much more than compared to the state and response indicators and the implications are
that avian diversity and population is hanging in the balance. This shows that the human
pressures and development needs are continuing unabated to the extent that
internationally protected sites ‗do not seem‘ to safeguard the wetland resources within
their borders, giving a widespread sense that this management regime is simply not
working. The accuracy of these claims is of critical importance to policy and funding
decisions. If internationally protected sites are failing despite best efforts, then better
options should be sought. If, on the other hand, internationally protected sites are
performing relatively well in a context of serious threats and limited resources, or are
simply performing better than the alternatives, their level of support should be increased.
The study also concludes that regulations should be complimented with engagement of
local communities in decision making. The importance of this work lies in the enhanced
understanding of different resource user‘s expectation of a sustainable wetland IBA and
therefore making a strong basis for the bottom up consultation process useful in the
collaborative wetland management of the wetland, which Africa in general and Kenya in
particular is looking upto for the benefits of both people and birds | en_US |
