Celebrating community in Kenya

The Born Free Kenya team was delighted to take part in, and proud to sponsor, the recent Tharaka Nithi Ura Gate Cultural Festival, an amazing annual community event held on the edge of Meru National Park.

Full of timeless traditions, ancient customs, music, dancing and crafts, the colourful festival brings together the people of Tharaka Nithi and Kitui, to celebrate the rich and diverse culture of the ‘Amiiru’ (the Meru people), and other communities living in the area. The festival offers a fantastic opportunity to socialise, get involved and enjoy the extraordinary heritage and culture of the landscape, and people, we have worked with for ten years.

Since its debut in 2015, the Ura Gate festival has a special theme each year, which is celebrated over the course of four days. This year’s topic was ‘Embracing culture as a tool for wildlife conservation and socio-economic development’ – the perfect opportunity for Born Free to spread the word about our work!

“We’re not sure we can think of a more apt festival theme for Born Free to be part of,” said Anna Cryer, from our Conservation team. “We work throughout the community lands surrounding Meru Conservation Area to protect lions, elephants, giraffes, and more. But, this relies on local people – our Pride of Meru, Saving Meru’s Giants and education programmes focus on building coexistence between communities and wildlife.”

The Born Free team

With 15,000 festival-goers each day, the event was a great opportunity for Born Free to showcase our effective ‘human-wildlife conflict mitigations tools’ – finding ways to help people and wild animals live in harmony, as well as how we use technology to monitor wildlife, and our vibrant community engagement platforms.

At the Born Free tent, visitors were fascinated by our model of a predator-proof boma –a reinforced enclosure to keep livestock safe from lions, hyenas and other carnivores. We also demonstrated our flashing predator deterrent lights, a camera trap – triggered by motion to keep an eye on wildlife, and promoted our extensive education programme – including school conservation clubs.

These are all essential ways we help promote compassionate conservation across the Meru landscape. Local government officials also attended the festival, so our Pride of Meru Manager Michael Mugo was delighted to explain why our work is so vital and has such an impact for wildlife, when they visited the Born Free tent.

Working with local communities is a Born Free priority and events such as this demonstrate why this is so important. The festival was a great opportunity for Born Free to promote our work, but also for our team to learn more about the different cultures living within the Meru landscape, and gain meaningful feedback from community members.

By connecting with local people, we can build on and learn from these relationships. Conservation is most effective when local communities are involved and empowered. By engaging with local stakeholders at events such as the Ura Gate festival, we hope to further involve people with Born Free’s essential work.

PRIDE OF MERU     SAVING MERU’S GIANTS