By Cathy Watson | Senior Advisor
On February 25, we held a meeting in Arua, the town nearest to the refugee settlements, to announce our departure and the closure of this project after seven years promoting trees.
It was a big day for us. We had a sense of peace and that this was the right thing to do. But naturally we also had mixed feelings going into it and might have become sad as the meeting went on. Luckily comments from our staff, from partners in government, the UN and NGOs, and from the community bolstered us.
Beida, the young war widow who is one of our community-based facilitators, had traveled from her home in Imvepi to be there. Sitting in the hotel where we held the gathering, she said: "This meeting shows that we have really worked. The journey has ended well."
John Oyimi, a leader on the refugee welfare council in Imvepi settlement who we had supported to attend, said: "The trees grew well because of timely delivery of seedlings". We liked that. Getting trees out of the nursery and into the hands of those who would plant them just as the rains started was something we always strived to do but often struggled with because of logistics. Clearly, it had worked out more times than not.
Oyimi also said: "in Imvepi, 70,633 refugees depend upon one resource and one resource alone: the tree." It was a good way to underscore the central role trees play in human well being generally but especially in displacement settings, and a reminder of why we had been so very persistent in keeping the project going.
Sarah from the Uganda Red Cross said: "Humanitarian is our mandate but now we also do tree growing."
The District Forest Officer for Madi Okollo said the project showed that the whole district needed support on trees and not just the settlements.
Others commented from the floor: "Trainings provided by ICRAF promoted peaceful co-existence", "The best survivors were indigenous trees" and "When we look after the trees, we look after the future."
Finally, a senior member of the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM), which administers all matters to do with refugees, said: "When there was an event or programme in the settlements needing trees, I always directed them to Osidi." John Osidi was our nursery manager.
Poignantly, the same OPM official even thanked us for holding a project close out meeting, saying he had had partners that simply disappeared without informing them.
Well, we were not going to do that. For one, we owe a big vote of thanks to OPM for keeping an eye on us in the settlements. In Imvepi and Rhino Camp, since November 2017 when we set up shop on the banks of River Enyau, we never had a single security incident, and legion were the times that the camp commandants gave us good advice and urged others to come to us for trees. They also made sure that two young overseas interns, both of whom did great work, could be accomodated in the "base camp".
Now, the focus for OPM is on how we hand over the learning centre and nursery. It is OPM's responsibility to ensure that this is done wisely and judiciously with the best possible chances of a good outcome.
I called Martin Koriang Naburi, the assistant commandant in charge of livelihoods and environment in Imvepi, from Nairobi to discuss the matter. He said that with our departure the nearest source of seedlings will be 60 km away in Koboko district. Procurement processes from that nursery mean that "sometimes the seedlings arrive as the rains are almost running out", which is "annoying and frustrating for people".
So, what might be a great solution, he said, is that the nursery and learning centre become a refugee-led organization or RLO.
According to UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, an RLO is an "organization or group in which persons with direct lived experience of forced displacement play a primary leadership role and whose stated objectives and activities are focused on responding to the needs of refugees and/or related communities."
Althought we know that it is not simple to run a nursery and outreach programme on trees, RLOs sound good to us and are very much trending. "In East Africa, RLOs have been seen to treat their communities (beneficiaries) with more dignity; they understand their communities and are more accessible and less bureaucratic," said another source.
Martin Naburi said he was holding a meeting with energy, livelihood and environment partners shortly and would raise it. "Whoever expresses interest, we will move with them," he said. "We will ask them to tell us how they plan to go about it, and those of your team like Joel can coach them." Forester Joel Adriko was our longest serving member of staff and has now transitioned to another project.
I also asked my colleague Dr Phosiso Sola about the close out meeting and how she felt it had gone. She said that partners and others "were very disapppointed that we were leaving." She added that tree diversity had emerged as very important with one senior local government official saying "I like teak but the way it is being extended (is too much)" and others asking "can we see shea butter trees coming back to the landscape?"
That brings me to the publication that I prepared for the close out meeting and which I proudly attach to this final GlobalGiving report. You can also download it here https://www.cifor-icraf.org/knowledge/publication/43024/
Consisting of 16 pages of text and over 100 photos and illustrations, it goes through what species of trees refugees planted, how many per species, how they arranged them on their plots, and what good came of it. It turns out that the refugees planted considerably more trees than we thought they would when we started, and many more species. They also retained trees on their plots. "The notion is that refugees will clear everything. But we see on the plots that two to four of the original trees are still standing. They value them for their various products and services," Dr Phosiso Sola is quoted as saying.
Among our learnings are: include multiple species catering for different purposes in every seedling distribution, and a minimum of five tree species, with zero introductions of new species; distributing even small numbers of indigenous species bolsters tree diversity if they grow; it is more economical, rational and efficient to produce smaller numbers of seedlings that are all planted than to produce a large number, some of which go unplanted or uncared for; and a plot-based biocircular economy that deploys any organic material, such as food waste as compost and “grey water” for watering crops, can greatly increase tree survival.
We urge you all to have a look at this epic report which documents the benefits that refugees -- and hosts -- gained from your generous gifts to this project: to name a few, more fruit, more income, more building material, more wood for cooking and more shade, less wind and reduced conflict with nationals.
Refugees are still coming across the border. And the settlements are still vast and heavily reliant on trees. We will not lose touch with those we worked with and for - and we will miss them. But we know we left a legacy in the settlements and the greater region and even in humanitarian thinking. We plan a dissemination seminar of our report in Kampala in July to the UN agences, large NGOs and government. We will also be sending it to the UNHCR Special Advisor on Climate in Geneva.
Along with two grants from the British government and one from a small NGO in the beginning, this was all your doing. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. This project will remain, at least for me, one of the undertakings in my life that makes me most proud. And I know it contributed to two PhDs and set several young people on good career courses or, in the case of our longstanding nursery workers, made them more economically secure. Besides all the benefits for refugees and hosts, that is no small thing. And think of those schools that now have a modicum of shade because of you. Thank you so very much. My email remains cathyhwatson@gmail.com if you should ever want to reach out. I have yours and will look for a project for you which might replace us in your hearts.
This is over for the time being. But we and you are not over. There's so much for us all to do and so much ahead for all of us. Thank you so much. You have been just the best.
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By Cathy Watson | Senior Advisor
By Cathy Watson | Senior Advisor
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