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Mazingira Day is here, stop planting trees for the camera
President William Ruto looks on as Sasha Chepkoech, a green ambassador plants a tree during the 9th Edition of the Kaptagat Integrated Conservation Programme in Simotwo, Elgeyo Marakwet County on July 12, 2025.
This Friday, Kenyans will once again pick up shovels and carry seedlings to mark Mazingira Day. Government officials will plant trees. Cameras will flash. Speeches will celebrate patriotism, restoration, and the promise of a greener future.
It makes for an inspiring picture. Kenya's ambition to plant 15 billion trees by 2032 deserves recognition. Few African nations have set such an audacious environmental target. But behind the ceremony lies an uncomfortable question: what happens after the seedlings go into the ground?
Tree planting has become Kenya's most visible symbol of climate action. It fits neatly into a photo opportunity, a press release, a campaign slogan. But trees are not policies. They do not thrive on applause. Without sustained care, science-based planning, and honest accounting, most seedlings will not survive the next dry season.
According to the Kenya Forest Service, many of the trees planted die within a year. Some are planted in the wrong season. Others in unsuitable locations. In the rush to meet targets, fast-growing exotics often displace native species that better support biodiversity and stabilise water systems. The result is green cover that looks impressive on paper but contributes little to genuine ecological recovery.
The heart of the problem is this: Kenya's approach to forest restoration remains ceremonial rather than strategic. We celebrate planting days, not management plans. Forest policy is announced with fanfare, then starved by budget cuts and undermined by poor coordination between national and county governments. The spotlight moves on. The seedlings do not.
Where is the accountability?
Real climate action cannot run on symbolism. It requires data, transparency, and follow-through. The government should publish annual, independently verified survival rates for all publicly funded planting campaigns. Counties must move beyond ad hoc drives and invest in community-managed nurseries, monitoring systems, and training for local forest officers. We need less theatre and more accountability.
Just as urgent is protecting what already exists. Kenya continues to lose patches of natural forest to encroachment, charcoal burning, and illegal logging even as new seedlings are planted elsewhere. This makes little sense. A single mature forest stores far more carbon and water than a hundred scattered saplings. Planting without protection is like filling a bucket with holes.
The National Tree Growing and Restoration Strategy rightly emphasises that restoration must be locally driven and socially inclusive. Yet, on the ground, community forest associations and indigenous groups often feel sidelined, with their knowledge being ignored. The success stories we do have, from Embobut to Arabuko Sokoke, emerged where communities share both responsibility and benefits. That model deserves replication, not rhetoric.
Tree planting can be transformative when done with integrity and respect. It can create jobs for young people, revive degraded catchments, and rebuild Kenya's ecological resilience. But only if it is guided by science, monitored honestly, and sustained with funding beyond one-day events.
The government's 15 billion tree pledge is not just about numbers. It is about credibility, the willingness to measure results, to correct course, and to care long after the cameras leave. Planting is the easy part. Growing forests that endure will demand policy, patience, and political will that extends beyond election cycles.
So, on Mazingira Day, let us plant our trees. But let us also demand the harder work that follows: nurturing them, protecting existing forests, and holding leaders to account for what was promised.
The author is NMG's climate editor.
