Charles Ochuka Aloo
Charles Ochuka Aloo
School of Physical and Biological Sciences
RESEARCH TOPIC:
AN ECOTOURISM MODEL FOR CONSERVATION OF THE MAASAI MAU FOREST, KENYA
ABSTRACT:
Ecotourism has emerged as a sustainable economic sector with favourable environment friendly practices in the recent past attracting high attention in the developing countries. It has therefore emerged as a strong tool for income generation, sociocultural preservation and biodiversity friendly. However, it is not clear among scholars how ecotourism it contributes to environmental conservation given that some of the activities involved are not well understood on their link to forest conservation. Thus, a model which gives more insight on the relationship of the various ecotourism elements to forest conservation is necessary. This study sought to develop an ecotourism model that would provide guideline for the conservation of Maasai Mau forest, Kenya . Specific objectives were to assess the influence of livelihood practices of Mau forest adjacent community on Forest conservation, to establish the influence of economic activities of Maasai Mau forest adjacent community on Forest conservation; to ascertain the influence of socio-cultural practices of Maasai Mau forest adjacent community on Forest conservation and to develop an ecotourism model that would provide conservation guidelines for Maasai Mau Forest, Kenya . The study employed a triangulation mixed method design involving quantitative and qualitative techniques. Target population comprised of 962 respondents. The sample size was 384 respondents from which stratified random sampling was used to achieve 6 heads of government agencies(KWS and KFS), 29 hotel and restaurant service providers, 339 community forest associations and 12 Travel & Tour Operators. Questionnaires with five point Likert scales were administered on the sampled community forest associations (CFAs) and hotels and restaurant service providers; interviews were used to collect data from the six government agencies top managers, from tour and travel while Focus group discussions (FGDs) were used to collect data from 12 travel and tour operators. Qualitative data was analyzed through thematic analysis. Means, standard deviations, frequency counts and percentages were used for descriptive statistics while regression analysis was used to compare the relationships between livelihood practices, economic activities, socio-cultural practices, and conservation. It was found that livelihood practices (M=2.74; SD=1.250), economic activities (M=2.61; SD=1.250), and socio cultural practices (2.86; SD=1.232) moderately influences the conservation of Maasai Mau forest. It is also illustrated economic activities have a negative and significant influence (β = -0. 189, t(353)=-3.255, p<.05), influence of livelihood practices are positive and significant (β =0.256, t(353)=5.441, p<.05) and socio-cultural practices of the adjacent community have positive and significant effect (β =0.307, t(353)=5.587, p<.05) on the conservation of Maasai Mau forest. This implies that for unit increase in economic activities lead to -0.189 unit changes in the conservation of the forest. For every unit increase in livelihood practices and socio cultural practices, there is 0.256 and .307 unit changes in the conservation of Maasai Mau forest respectively. The overall model explained a significant variance of 34.6% in forest conservation(R2=.346, F(3,354)=62.193, p<.05). This implies that the model is a good fit and therefore can make a good guide for forest conservation. It is concluded that increase in economic activities leads more to forest depletion. This implies that ecotourism model can guide local communities to generate new sources of livelihood from the natural forest, reinforce traditional culture and contribute to the environmental conservation. The study findings on an ecotourism model may provide guideline for suitable forest conservation approaches capable of ameliorating the problems currently being witnessed round Maasai Mau Forest