Green Tourism Summit & Mazingira Awards 2015,
11th – 12th June 2015, Crowne Plaza Hotel, Nairobi
YOUTH AND GREEN DEVELOPMENT AGENDA
NICKSON OTIENO,
B. Arch (UoN), MSc. in Sustainable Urban Development (UoN),
President, World Student Community for Sustainable Development (WSCSD-KENYA),
Director, Trine Architects Ltd. and NIKO Tours and Travel
Ass. Lecturer, Technical University of Kenya
P.O. Box 4892-00100, Nairobi
Email: nickson.otieno@wscsd.org, otienonickson@gmail.com
Web: www.wsccsd.org, www.nikotoursandtravel.com
Tel: +254(0)722612841, +254(0)773135547
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Presentation Outline
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What is Green Development Agenda?
What is the current status of youth engagement in
Green Development Agenda?
What are the gaps that need to be addressed in
empowering and mobilizing youth to drive the Green
Agenda?
How can we address these gaps?
The case of WSCSD-Kenya?
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
What is Green Development Agenda?
Green Economy,
Blue Economy,
Circular Economy,
Sustainable Development
or a Transition Culture,
a Paradigm Shift?
Principles
1.
From “anywhere” to “here”
2.
From “theirs” to “ours”
3.
From "divest" to "reinvest”
4.
From "someone should" to "let's”
5.
From "Old Boys Network" to "Everyone an Investor“
6.
From niche to mainstream
7.
From "not again!" to "never again“
8.
From 'Clone Towns/Villages' to 'Places of Possibility'
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Is GD relevant for the Youth?
How can Green Development improve outcomes for young people?
 Jobs and employability - enabling participation in the green economy, and
using environmental activity as a stepping stone to employment

Resilience, health and behaviour - green exercise, active travel and
structured programmes in the environment to turn around disaffected young people
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Personal responsibility - empowering young people through environmental
action and volunteering
Youth as
BENEFICIARIES
-Large population
- Vulnerable to
unsustainable
development
Youth as
ACTORS
Youth as
PARTNERS
- Green champions
- Green volunteers
YOUTH AS CHANGE MAKERS
-Green Activists
For Peace and Sustainable
-Greenterpreneurs
Development
.. / www.wscsd.org
world student community for sustainable development
Holistic youth engagement in order to unlock their potential?
Axis 1
POLICY FORMULATION
With the participation of
youth
Axis 3
Axis 2
CIVIC ENGAGEMENT,
DEMOCRATIC
PARTICIPATION and
SOCIAL INNOVATON
CAPACITY
DEVELOPMENT
For the transition to
adulthood
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Current Status
 A number of youth organizations focusing on environmental sustainability
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being formed. Both a strength and weakness
Government and policy-making organizations acknowledging youth
participation and youth empowerment:
 Department dealing with youth affairs, national youth council, youth
enterprise fund, 30% procurement policy, national youth policy being
developed
 How about mainstreaming sustainability in departments?
Many organizations like WWF, NEMA, UNEP; NGOs having youth programs
Student councils, unions; what about sustainability?
Attempts to encourage youth service – NYS, volunteer works
Attempts to provide incentives for youth engagement (Mazingira Challenge,
Miss Environment, Nature Challenge, Green Innovation Awards)
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Gaps
 Limited awareness on Green Agenda (concepts like ESD, Social/Green
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Entrepreneurship … not well understood)
Limited platforms for youth to share their innovative ideas for advice
and support to develop them further
Few Green ‘stars’ – both at national and grassroots level
Inadequate resources and capacity – financial, technical
Interventions focused on environmental sustainability yet many youth
think more about economic sustainability – securing their own
sustainable livelihoods
Disenfranchised youth (shifting priorities, youth organizations often
competing rather than building synergy)
Youth not integrated into institutional governance
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Addressing the Gaps
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Suggestions for Addressing the Gaps
 Target all young people (all students, NEET and young professionals)
 Forming youth SD alliances that engage in developing practical green initiatives
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addressing both the real needs of the youth and sustainability goals (umbrella youth SD
networks)
Raising youth SD experts and role models; building their capacities; organization models
that reach out to the grassroots
Providing incentives for youth (Internships, scholarships, attachments, awards)
Creating long-term and holistic opportunities for environmental volunteerism in specific
local communities: Competitions, challenges (coordination),
National youth-led and elderly-steered Consumption campaigns
Establishing a Youth Green Fund/Green Fellowships – incubation, mentorship?
Integrate youth leadership into institutional governance: Youth representatives in
organizational sustainability committees
Greening the National Youth Service
Promote service-learning, transdisciplinary education and research, living laboratories,
learning centers and online education
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Case Study: WSCSD-Kenya
Projects/Initiatives
 Youth Encounter on Peace
 Student Summit for Sustainability
 Adopt an Ecosystem Initiative
 Adopt a forest initiative
 Adopt a river initiative
 Nyakongo Water and Sanitation Project
 Sustainable Village Initiative
 Sustainability Training Program
 Green Entrepreneurship Workshop
ESD Networks
 Kenya Green University Network (KGUN)
 RCE Kenya Youth League
Proposed Initiatives
 National ESD Barazas
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Masterplan of Nyakongo Center for SD
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
S3-2012
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Sustainability trainings
Adopt a river initiative
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Adopt-a-Forest Initiative
Scenario 1: Indispensable Resource
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Forest ecosystems in Kenya range from montane rainforests, savannah woodlands, dry forests to coastal
forests and mangroves.
They rank high as the country’s natural asset and play critical ecological, social, cultural, and economic
functions.
Scenario 2: Dwindling Resource
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Deforestation is estimated at 50,000 hectares annually, with a consequent yearly loss to the economy of over
USD 19 million
Current forest cover is 6.99%, which falls below the constitutional requirement of 10%
Scenario 3: Untapped Resource
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University enrolment in 2013 was 324,600 (Kenya Bureau of Statistics, 2014).
On the other hand, the combined university land resource amounts to thousands of hectares
/ www.wscsd.org
Scenario 1
Scenario 2
Scenario 3
Adopt-a-Forest Initiative
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Key Components
1. Production: Establishment and management of
tree nurseries in all universities
2. Outreach: Planting in targeted ecosystems and
community awareness
3. Research: Forest cover surveys, carbon footprint
measurement and survival rate studies
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Delivery Mechanism
I. Campus Afforestation: Each university buys seedlings from the student -run tree
nursery for greening the campus. Proceeds used for the day-to-day operations of the
student association.
II. Freshman Orientation: Each freshman plants a tree at a designated spot within
campus during the orientation week and commit to nurture it till graduation.
III. Student-led Forest Ecosystem Management and Conservation: Each student
association adopts a forest ecosystem of preference, undertakes its long-term
conservation and restoration with the support of external stakeholders while creating
awareness and involving the communities living adjacent.
IV. Carbon Offsetting: Each university commits to offset carbon emissions accrued from
air travel by its top management through planting a number of trees equivalent to their
yearly emissions at the university’s ‘Green Zone’
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Achievements in the pilot phase
(2013-14)
17 universities reached out to and at various stages of
implementing the initiative
Inspired formation of new environmental student associations
in 4 universities
Notable university land contributions to their student associations
for establishment of Green Zones: Moi University (20 acres),
Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, JKUAT
(2 acres), Mount Kenya University (8.5 acres)
Led to formal Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between
WSCSD-Kenya and universities for long-term collaboration in
Greening of their campuses. MOU signed with JKUAT in 2013,
draft MOU with Moi University and University of Eldoret
Inspired formation of the Kenya Green University Network for
championing the greening of Kenyan universities (to be launched in
June
2015)
world
student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
Prof. Ogechi, Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Student Affairs, Moi University (assisted by WSCSD’s President,
Mr. Nickson Otieno) plants a tree as he hands over the 20 acre piece of land to Moi University
Environmental Club (MUEC) to establish a botanical garden/Green Zone.
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org
So who is responsible for achieving
the Green Agenda?
I, ME, MYSELF
WE, US, OURSELVES
Together, let us empower and
mobilize youth in Kenya
world student community for sustainable development / www.wscsd.org